I've chained my dreams (to the blue, blue sky)
by SillyThing
Summary: TIME TRAVELER'S WIFE-AU A love story concerning naked time travel,adorkable children,a warning from the future, a reluctant Chosen One, sassy old people,and a jutsu gone wrong,though not necessarily in that order. Or, Senju Tobirama has come unstuck in time. He should really stop trying out his new experimental Jutsus on himself. TobiXMada
1. Time-Traveling Nuisance

**Hello! Welcome to the Time Traveler's Wife AU nobody wanted or asked for, but I wrote anyway!**

 **Only thing I tweaked from canon is that Tobirama didn't invent the Hiraishin, he imported it from Land of Whirlpools and tried to make it more efficient. This is AU from the moment Tobirama uses it for the first time, only instead of killing Izuna, this happens.**

 **Hope you enjoy it!**

 **Crossposted at Ao3**

* * *

The symbol comes to his mind easily, naturally, nudging his quill into drawing it effortlessly on the piece of yellowed parchment. A circle inside another, larger circle, and six lines that loosely resemble wings. It looks perfect, and Tobirama stares at it in confusion for a few minutes, willing it to spill it's secrets, because he doesn't know where it came from.

"If you stare at that with a just little bit more intensity, it'll burst into flames," Toka sing-songs somewhere behind him.

"Does a closed door mean nothing in this house?" Tobirama snaps, but it comes out more longsuffering than scathing. Privacy is a dream he doesn't bother chasing anymore.

Tōka snorts and hops herself up to sit on his desk. Three very rare, very expensive scrolls tumble to the ground and halfheartedly roll away. "What's that?" she asks, peering down at the parchment Tobirama's been staring into submission for the past minute. Her long hair crawls across the parchment and smears the ink.

He sighs, running a hand over his face. He can feel the migraine coming, "A summoning mark,"

Tōka hums in thought, "Odd look for a summoning mark,"

"Yes, I'm aware"

"What did it do for you to glare at it like that?"

"I don't know what it means." Tobirama traces the edges with his eyes again, where the ink has become smudged, "It just...came to me,"

It's unusual, to say the least. Neither drawing or calligraphy have ever been his strong suits, and he generally has to doodle idly for a good few hours before his efforts yield something even remotely accommodating to his needs, when designing a new seal. It shouldn't be this...effortless.

"Maybe it's fate," Tōka shrugs, already bored with the topic.

This time, Tobirama snorts. He carefully cleans his brush and leaves it in his case, rising to his feet and putting the strange mark off his mind. He's nothing if not practical, after all. "Maybe it is," he agrees sardonically, and leads the way to the training grounds.

* * *

He's going to die. Tobirama's certain of it.

His comrades are locked in combat, all of them in various stages of exhaustion, some of them near collapse.

Not far from him, Hashirama and Madara are facing each other, leveling the landscape with each powerful blow. But even their strength, titanic as it is, is dwindling.

"Please, Madara," Hashirama tries, as always, the plead in his voice obvious and for all to hear. He says nothing more, but what he wants is , end this, brother. Come to my side.

For a second, the Uchiha looks like he's thinking about it. His eyes fade back to onyx and he stands for just a moment, heaving breaths seeming to rip through his body like earthquakes. They are all tired and halfway dead, and for all that Tobirama knows both he and Hashirama never aim to kill while faced with the other, a fight is a fight and death is always a possibility. If he yielded, it would end. If he gave up to Hashirama's pleads for peace, it would all end.

For all that Tobirama scoffs at his brother's childish dreams, in moments like these he can see the appeal.

But, as always, Madara's eyes stray to the side, roaming over the bodies littering the ground and to his brother, Izuna, his one true north. He pauses on the blood on the floor and on Tobirama's hands, as if to reassure himself of the choices he makes. The sharingan flares to life once more, and he launches himself to Hashirama with a battle cry.

Tobirama breathes in deep, trying to will the pain into submission and force his body to move. They're evenly matched, he and Izuna. They've been evenly matched all their lives, and their fight could go on forever, but… But Tobirama is tired, bone-weary in a way he's never been before. His body aches from exertion, and the gaping wound on the side of his torso, courtesy of Izuna's sword which now lies scattered in pieces, pulls every time he draws in a breath. Izuna's eyes see him move before he even thinks of moving, the twitch of his muscles and flare of his tattered chakra reserves enough tell for him, and his renowned speed means nothing when faced with an enemy that can practically read his mind.

"Senju," Izuna says, eyes flickering black for a second before bleeding back to red. He's tired, too. "Yield,"

Tobirama doesn't dignify that with an answer, instead hurtling forward, raising his sword without much finesse to take advantage of the Uchiha's dwindling strength. Izuna moves his neck out of the way and the blade connects with Izuna's upper arm, drawing a cascade of blood like an explosion when the man ducks low. Tobirama feels a sharp pain on his upper thigh, the shrill agony of steel piercing through skin and flesh nearly enough to make him scream.

"Izuna!" Madara yells then, releasing an attack that sends Hashirama flying, even as he sounds absolutely ready to drop everything and rush to his brother's side. Tobirama often wonders what it must be like to be the focus of that razor sharp, laser focused attention, to be the center of all of that coalesced sheer willpower. Surely it must be exhausting, but Izuna handles it with the easy, detached grace with which he seems to handle everything.

"Just a scratch," he says, letting blood flow from his wound freely as steady red eyes watch Tobirama pull the kunai from where it's been deeply imbedded into the meat of his thigh, the serrated blade tearing the flesh further on the way out. Blood flows like life leaving his body, sticky and rich under the midday sun, and Tobirama allows himself a smile at his enemy's quick-thinking strategy. Feigning exhaustion, risking injury; all as a last resort to maim Tobirama's greatest asset: his speed.

Not far from something he himself would have done.

"Tobirama," Izuna says, looking down at him. There's a cut under his eye that's bleeding freely, and his clothes are torn and tinged red in spots. They are not their brothers, with their seemingly endless power and imperatives to never truly hurt one another. They are human, they are vicious, and they're halfway dead today,"Yield,"

Tobirama scoffs and stands up straight, his arm nearly sagging with the weight of his sword. He's not done yet. He has one last weapon, a final ace up his sleeve. He meant to try it out before using it in battle, but well-if Izuna kills him, it's not like he'll get another chance to even try it.

He smirks, packing the expression with as much of the conceited superiority he isn't feeling at the moment as he can, and watches the emotions play out of Izuna's face. Surprise, outrage, anger. Truly these Uchihas are much too easy to manipulate.

He dodges Izuna's first attack and lays the mark, quickly returning to a fighting stance. His chest is heaving and he feels lightheaded from the blood loss, but if this works he just needs to hold on a little bit longer. If it doesn't, he'll die, but that's out of his hands. When they clash again, he waits until the last possible moment, until Izuna's kunai is embedding itself into his armor, until the feeling is nearly claustrophobic, and he can feel the other's nearly wasted reserves of chakra colliding with his own. He waits until the mark is perfectly lined behind Izuna's body, right where it needs to be for the blow to be fatal before releasing the last of his chakra in one brilliant flash-

"Hiraishin "

After this, everything happens very fast.

He feels himself flickering into nonexistence, summoned by the mark-

Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Madara tumble to his knees, clutching at his chest-

"Shit!" Izuna says, letting go of the hilt and reaching for Tobirama, black eyes wide and slightly panicked-

...panicked ?

Then everything fades to black.

* * *

He comes to, naked and bleeding profusely, in the middle of a forest. It's cold, which is strange, since it's spring, and not having the constricting weight of his armour and his happuri on him feels disconcerting. He reaches out his trembling chakra and instinctively searches for the flaring bonfire that is his brother, the only one of the Senju who never bothers to hide his chakra signature, only to feel nothing. Hashirama is nowhere nearby, or maybe he's-

Tobirama's breath catches in his throat.

No.

His brother is just far away.

He's aware that he's trying to convince himself, but it wouldn't do to panic when he doesn't even know what the situation his. He's teleported himself somewhere much further than he expected, it would seem. Something went wrong with the jutsu. No problem. The lack of clothing is far more intriguing, but he adds it to the list of things to consider later. For now though, he must focus on returning to the battlefield before his absence becomes costly.

There's three chakra signatures nearby, tiny and unsteady, but promising, like that of small children at the very beginning of their training. Tobirama breathes in, and begins walking in that direction, trying his best not to let his mangled leg slow him down. The forest holds no clues for him, but that is not unexpected. After all, he's not his brother, who can ask the trees for what they've seen and heard, and speak to the earth as if it were his old friend. All he can do is follow his senses as best as he can, and pray that by the time he returns it won't be too late.

After a few minutes following first delicate tendrils of chakra and, as he got closer, the distinct sound of children's laughter, he reaches his destination: a clearing, in which a small house is settled. The low roof is slanted to the side, and serves as a resting place for about a dozen doves, all of them peering curiously down at Tobirama as he makes his way covertly towards the front of the house. He hides behind a large oak by the porch, surveying the vast vegetable gardens that surround the small estate, and waits.

"I'm not doing it!" he hears one of the children, a boy, crow.

"Sensei says you have to," a girl retaliates.

"You'll have to make me!"

The sing-songed reply, followed by mock battle cries and laughter reminds him a little bit too much of rare afternoons spent neglecting his duty in favour of dipping his brother's face repeatedly into a puddle, and he has to shake his head to free it from the memories before he ventures a look. What he sees has him gasping for breath.

There, hidden by the shadow of the small house, are three children. They were working the garden recently, it would seem, but their work somehow developed into an impromptu game of ninja tag, if the discarded garden tools and trampled weeds are any indication. This is nothing out of the ordinary, for children are children, even in times of war, and these small diversions are the pieces of their childhood they carve out for themselves whenever they can.

No. What has Tobirama's eyes widening and his heartbeat spiking up is that two of the children are Senju, judging by their pale chakra and brown eyes and hair. One boy and the girl, both of them laughing exuberantly and chasing the other boy, who is also laughing, and is undoubtedlyUchiha. If his eyes, hair and complexion weren't enough proof of his lineage, the Uchiha crest displayed proudly on the back of his pale blue haori would.

He's so distracted by his finding, at first he doesn't notice the argument going on inside the house until a harried man steps out, hisses " _And stay right there!_ " to whoever is inside, shuts the door quite firmly, and turns to look at the tree behind which Tobirama is hiding. Tobirama concentrates very hard not to faint as he ducks back behind the tree, because the person looking at him is-

"Tobirama," the man who is himself, but can't possibly be, calls out, gaze not wavering from the tree. "I can see the blood pooling at your feet,"

There's raucous laughter from inside the house at that. Tobirama peeks his head out from behind the trunk just in time to see his other version look up at the sky and sigh, as if asking for strength. He's older, this other version, but not by much. There's a few more lines around his eyes, but the most jarring difference is perhaps the man's content expression. He's not smiling, or anything of the sort, but he does look-calm. Less severe.

It's extremely disturbing.

"What is this?" Tobirama asks, stepping out from behind the tree and peering suspiciously at himself, completely forgetting the fact that he's still stark naked, bleeding, and there's children nearby. His mind is racing, coming up with and discarding a dozen different explanations in a second, "Genjutsu? Izuna is not that powerful,"

More laughter from inside the house, and a put upon " _Hey_!" that has Tobirama frowning, because those voices are-

"None of that," his older self says, glaring over his shoulder at the door for a moment before returning his attention to Tobirama, "You are twenty-four, I'm twenty-nine. I've been where you are, and now we're both here in this present. You'll be gone shortly, so listen closely: the Hiraishin _worked_ , it didn't go wrong.

Tobirama's mind is reeling, "What-What does that mean? What is happening to me?"

"You're exactly where you have to be. That is all you need to know,"

"All I need to know? You've told me nothing!" Tobirama snaps, hands fisting at his sides He's seconds away from fainting, he just knows it, "How do I know that what I see is real, and not something conjured by that cursed Sharingan?!"

The older Tobirama's lips twitch into a smile, _"Anything essential is invisible to the eyes,_ "

"I don't understand," Tobirama says, shaking his head, but even as he speaks he can feel himself flickering away. He can't breathe, the world is spinning. He's talking to himself and it is impossible, but that truly is himself. The same chakra signature, the same mannerisms, the same face. How did this happen? How does he fix it? What does it mean? Why would it eve-

" _Tobirama_ ," a distinctly familiar voice chides as the door opens. Tobirama's thoughts ground to a screeching halt, "Can't you be less cryptical about this?"

Madara Uchiha's black eyes are peering at him curiously over his other self's shoulder, and they're the last thing he sees before everything fades away. He ends up in the dining room of his house, sitting on his usual spot, with Hashirama and Tōka staring at him over their soup, speechless.

"What the-" Tōka begins, but the rest of her sentence is drowned by Hashirama crying, "Little Brother!" and toppling the table over in his haste to attach himself to Tobirama with all his limbs. Tobirama passes out from blood loss and oxygen deprivation.

* * *

"You were gone for three days," Tōka says when he awakens, her stoic facade shattered as she wrings her hands on her lap in an uncharacteristically nervous gesture. He's lying on his bed with his brother partially draped over him, caught in uneasy sleep even as he holds onto Tobirama's wrist, as if afraid to let go.

Three days.

"You disappeared," Tōka manages, her voice thin and shaky. "You were there, and then you just…faded."

So, it wasn't a dream. Great.

"Where did you go?" she asks. Tobirama doesn't answer, but looks resolutely at the ceiling. "Little Cousin . What happened?"

"I don't know," he growls, shifting a bit and feeling the stitches on his side and his thigh pull. "It didn't make any sense."

When he blinks, Uchiha Madara's eyes peer at him curiously from behind his closed eyelids, like he's a strange specimen of a foreign species, or maybe a particularly stubborn kill. Tobirama grits his teeth.

* * *

Once he finally manages to peel Hashirama off his person, he spends hour upon hour poring over his notes, reading and re-reading every single detail, trying to understand where the Jutsu went wrong, trying to figure out what happened.

The Hiraishin worked, it didn't go wrong, his other self said, but he'll be damned if he's going to believe the judgement of a figment of his feverish imagination, especially if said figment thought it prudent to turn his back on Uchiha Madara out of all people. Tobirama rakes his brain trying to figure out the meaning of that particular apparition, but comes up blank. He stays locked up inside his room for a whole week, which even for himself is pushing it, but his clansmen say nothing. Every half-hour, like clockwork, either Hashirama or Tōka poke their heads through the now perpetually ajar door, a panic set in to their features like they're waiting for him to disappear again.

He can't really assure them that it won't happen again. All he can do is try to figure out what went wrong. With every hour that passes, the whole thing seems to him more and more like a dream, and it's only the shadows on Hashirama's face that remind him that he was actually gone from the world for days , that his family thought he'd died , and they'd been left without even a body to bury, instead of caught in a dream for a few minutes.

Had it truly been his future self who addressed him? Had he truly been so calm with Uchiha Madara at his back? It doesn't bear thinking.

A week goes by, then two, then a month. Seasons change and spring rolls into summer, and Tobirama has no answers. Another month goes by. His family stops tip-toeing nervously around him, they stop invading his privacy every few minutes to make sure he's still there. His brother's duties as Clan Head and his dream of peace once more become the center of his attention.

Tobirama himself doesn't precisely give up on his research, but he allows it to become secondary. Uchiha Madara's eyes fade from his dreams, and his future self's tranquility blurs in his mind. He convinces himself that whatever it was, it was nothing more than a fluke, temporary, reversible, and one time only.

This is, of course, when it happens again.

* * *

One minute he's feeding the falcons, and the next one he's springing to his feet and dodging a fireball the size of a horse, buried in snow up to his ankles. The heat falls against his back like a curtain he avoids just in time, but his movements are followed by the smell of singed hair. Even as he falls into a defensive stance, he's acutely aware of the fact that he's naked. The cold burns and his breath comes out in visible puffs, and he has no weapons, but with all this snow he has enough water to level a small army.

He goes through the hand signs and gathers chakra in his throat, the water dragon vicious and deadly and already perfectly pictured in his mind-

" _Tobirama_!" a child screeches, extremely high and extremely young and extremely terrified.

Tobirama nearly chokes on his own burning chakra trying to swallow it down, falling to his knees on the snow.

"Oh, Gods! Did I hurt you? I didn't mean it! I was training!" the child cries, and there are tiny, freezing hands hovering over his face and shoulders, unsure of what to do. Tobirama tries to gather enough breath to tell the kid to stop yelling in his ear, but he can barely do anything other than shiver miserably, his knees going numb, "I didn't know you'd show up! I'm sorry, I'm sorry!"

There's an invocation, and then there's a heavy woolen cloak wrapping over Tobirama's shoulders, keeping the worst of the cold at bay. Tobirama looks up,and his breath catches in his throat. Huge, terrified black eyes are looking at him from a face that's much too small, much too innocent, to belong to one of those he considers his enemies.

"Tobirama?" the Uchiha boy, who can't be more than eight or nine, asks. Concern drips from his every pore, and it's hard to even look at.

"Who are you?" Tobirama asks, voice coming out far more soft and weak than he'd meant, but he figures after swallowing a ball of his own chakra he should just be glad he can even speak at all.

The boy blinks owlishly at him.

"Oh," he says, comprehension visibly dawning on his face, "You're not the same Tobirama that came to see me yesterday, are you?"

...yesterday?

"...I've never seen you before," is what he settles for, trying very hard not to let his heart beat itself out of his throat. What does the boy mean , "yesterday"?

The tiny Uchiha perks up at this, completely oblivious to Tobirama's inner turmoil.

"Oh!" he says, and grins. There's snow caught in his raven hair, and he's not wearing adequate clothes for the winter, Tobirama notices absently, "Well, that's good! I've been rehearsing for this. Hum...Ok."

He closes one eye and sticks his tongue out in concentration, then takes a deep breath.

 _"It's only with the heart that one can see rightly,_ " he recites, then looks up at Tobirama expectantly. His nose is red on his pale face.

Tobirama blinks several times.

"What?" the boy asks, looking confused "No good? I'm sure that's how it went. You made me repeat it three times! "

This does not help dissipate Tobirama's confusion in the slightest.

"I made you repeat it?"

"The first time we met!" the boy nods, then clarifies, "Well, the first time I met you, I guess. Since this is the first time you are meeting me,"

"You're mixing tenses," Tobirama points out absently, a reflex leftover from growing up with his grammatically impaired older brother, as he tries to process all this new information and turn it into something that makes sense .

The tiny Uchiha huffs and crosses his arms over his chest in a very grown up-and very familiar- fashion, "Well, you did it first, with all the time-traveling "

He rolls his eyes for good measure. The gratuitous use of ridiculous, fiction-related terms does not pass unnoticed. A wind picks up then, cold and unforgiving. Long tresses of raven hair lash out like whips. The image is disturbingly familiar. Tobirama frowns, suspicion gnawing at the pit of his stomach, "Who are you?"

The boy blinks owlishly at him, then scratches the bridge of his nose thoughtfully, "I can't tell you my last name," he says apologetically, but then he grins wide and reaches out his hand to Tobirama's, "But you can call me Madara. Nice to meet you!"

He is still gaping when the world begins fading to black. He has a second to realize that eight year old Uchiha Madara is missing one of his front bottom teeth, then he's sitting on top of his clothes inside the falcon cage. The old lady in charge of correspondence faints.

* * *

"It's not possible," Tōka states, as if trying to convince herself.

"But it's happening," Hashirama points out, mystified.

Tobirama groans, and continues to bang his forehead against the table.

"Time-travel…" his brother says, for the fifteenth time, the bewilderment in his voice battling with childish excitement.

"Genjutsu, until proven otherwise," Tōka snaps at him, and slams a hand down on the table, hard. "Cut that out, Tobirama." That's the low, dangerous growl she used to use on him as a child, and it usually came right before a shoe collided with his head. Tobirama sits up straight at once.

"But how?" Hashirama stresses "I'm not the genjutsu expert, but I know they cannot stretch so long, and at intermittent times? Also, if he were in a genjutsu, he wouldn't disappear for fucking days at a time,"

"The Uchiha have surprised us before," Tōka counters, arms crossed. The three of them have been going in circles for the past hour, repeating the things they know over and over and hoping at some point it will all start making sense.

"Izuna is not that good," Tobirama states for what feels like the thousandth time. Not that he actually believes he's been jumping back and forth through 's just that he can't really see the Uchiha second in command coming up with such an elaborate jutsu, much less executing it in the middle of battle. Izuna is an efficient fighter, much like himself, not given to prolonging a kill, not even for a larger scheme. Besides, why would he do it? What would be the point of showing him an older version of himself? Of showing him Senju children playing with Uchihas? Why show him a younger version of Madara? It makes no sense , he has no motive .

Quietly, like she doesn't really want to say it, Tōka ventures, "But Madara is."

Heavy silence drops over them like a curtain, because even after all these years the Uchiha Clan Head is a sore topic when the three of them are alone. Hashirama's usually open and cheerful face closes off, and Tobirama grits his teeth. Nothing in this world seems to matter more to his brother than keeping the dredges of a one-time friend's innocence near his heart.

In his brother's eyes, Uchiha Madara can do no true harm.

"He didn't do it," Hashirama finally says, and that is that.

Tobirama couldn't bring himself to share what he'd seen, merely confiding that he'd been lead to believe he was five years into the future the first time, and approximately fifteen years into the past in the second. He has a feeling that telling his brother who he'd seen both times would not end well, for any party involved.

"I saw him fall," Tobirama says. They haven't spoken of the day of the Incident in the two months since it happened, and the details seem blurry in his mind: Madara's hand clutching at his chest, Izuna's wide eyed panic- "As I faded,"

Hashirama nods once, "For a moment, yes. Then they retreated, but I didn't pay much attention, as I was looking for you,"

Tobirama suppresses the urge to sigh at his brother turning his back on an enemy so blatantly, and instead focuses on trying to piece together the information he has. A few minutes of silence, then,

"Time-travel, " Hashirama says, yet again , and Tōka groans, throwing her hands in the air in clear surrender. Hashirama grins, "On the slim chance that it's true, think what you could do with this power, little brother! The things you could learn , the people you could meet , the tragedies you cou-"

"No," Tōka growls, and Hashirama's mouth snaps closed with a click, "On the slim, thin, minuscule chance that it might be true, you can do nothing." she crosses her arms and leans back on her seat "If you're truly slipping through cracks in the fabric of time, even the smallest change could fuck up our existence even worse than it already is,"

Hashirama pouts.

"You're no fun, Tōka-chan,"

The glare he gets could peel the skin of lesser men, or at least men who didn't grow up with her. Tobirama ponders telling her he's spoken with at least two people, one on each occasion, but decides against it, since it would entail discussing the contents of what he's still regarding as extremely vivid hallucinations.

"I had considered that," he says instead, "We haven't enough information, so caution is prudent," If he approaches the whole thing as if it were a mission, he finds it isn't so hard to think about it.

"Yes, yes," Hashirama rolls his eyes, " _Caution_. We wouldn't want you to bring the apocalypse upon us, would we? Or worse , actually have fun , for a change,"

Tobirama glares at him.

"It's serious, Hashirama!" Tōka says, slamming a hand down on the table and making the cutlery rattle, "Messing with time could be-"

"Ah!" Hashirama is grinning triumphantly, "So you are saying that it is time-travel!"

"No ," Tōka narrows her eyes to slits of pure hatred, "I'm saying that if it-"

Tobirama is getting ready to tune them out-something that comes to him naturally after a lifetime of these arguments-when the room fades and he finds himself sitting on cold stone, an onslaught of wind raising gooseflesh on his bare skin. One does not appreciate the easy comfort of wearing clothes until that is taken away.

He's in a camp, albeit a small one. A fire crackles quietly and a horse rests a few feet away, not at all startled by Tobirama's sudden materialization. Standing on a slope a little ways away, a lone figure stands gazing out into the distance, cloaked in twilight. Tobirama grabs a discarded quilt from the ground and wraps it around himself before reaching out his sensor chakra, which is not something he had an opportunity to do before. He cautiously feels the individual, sending small tendrils of his pale blue chakra in his general direction, and narrowing his eyes at what he feels.

In the end, he only proves to himself what he expected to find: that the only person in miles around is the person he's looking at, and that that person is Uchiha Madara. The overwhelmingly hot chakra sizzles when it comes in contact with his own, and it takes effort not to physically recoil from it. He can tell from his reduced height and unsteady chakra flow that he's a child yet, not a man, and what this implies leaves Tobirama gobsmacked and thrilled all at once.

So it is true. This is no genjutsu. He is truly standing here, looking at a young Uchiha Madara losing himself in his own thoughts.

The tragedies you could prevent, Hashirama had wanted to say, and the heady power of knowing exactly how many could be prevented, if he were to reach out right now and strike, is nearly unbearable. He moves without even realising it, taking cautious steps forward towards the unsuspecting figure, feeling the air currents shift around him as he wallows in the need kill, now .

Tobirama has never been one to wallow in his emotions, which is not to say he doesn't have them. He does, but he simply does not allow them to cloud his judgement, the way his brother so often does. He's the calculator, the strategist, the cold hearted soldier-because someone has to be. And so he calculates, looking at the turned back of his most hated enemy, and ponders the pros and cons of going through with this.

Would it truly be devastating to the fabric of time, he wonders, if Uchiha Madara ceased to exist a good decade before coming on to his true power? The temptation is devastating, and he takes another step forward without even meaning to.

"I can feel you wanting to kill me," Madara says, regarding him over his shoulder. "Bad Tobirama."

His voice is yet unbroken and his eyes are still without perpetual bruises underneath them, and suddenly all of Tobirama's intent leaves him, because he is looking at a child,"How long have you known me for?" he asks instead, clutching the quilt closer to himself.

"I can't tell you," Madara says. When Tobirama narrows his eyes at him, he shrugs, "You never want to tell me anything about the future. It's only fair I get to not tell you about the past,"

"You seem certain I'm from the future," he comments. Uchiha Madara is nothing if not absolutely mistrustful of other people's intentions, being known to even doubt his own kin's allegiance. Child or not, he would not trust a stranger.

"You told me. Besides, you always look the same," the boy says. After a pause, he adds, "Also, I've seen you. Not you , but the other... you. Present tense- you,"

This sets Tobirama's head spinning, and all he can do is ask, "You know who I am?"

Madara smirks half in in the shadows, barely touched by the fire's light.

"You're Senju Tobirama, son of Butsuma, brother of Hashirama," he says, then chuckles, "You are a funny looking little boy who'll grow up into being my own personal time traveling nuisance. That's all I know,"

"We're enemies,"

Madara turns to look at him fully then, the lopsided smile on his face making him seem like he's in on a joke he won't bother sharing. He looks older than he did when they first met, that fateful day on the river, when Hashirama had to give up on a friendship that always meant to him more than brotherhood ever did. It was that day that Tobirama's loathing for his enemy, that could so easily command his brother's absolute devotion with minimal effort and just as easily discard it, as if it were so much dirt, truly solidified.

Tobirama is not a man easily led by his emotions. But he's never hated anyone the way he hates the boy before his eyes, and the man that he'll become.

"Senju Tobirama and I, we're enemies. He's my enemy. You?" Madara takes a step closer, his face illuminated by the small fire.

There's faint bags under his eyes, and scratches on his pale cheeks. Once again, he's not dressed for the cold and his nose is red, the image a stark reminder that he's a child still, no matter the blood on his hands, the blood that's already there, and the blood that'll come after. He smiles with cracked lips and shivers in the cold, long hair whipping out in the wind.

"You'll always be my friend," he says, onyx eyes wide and clear and so certain, and Tobirama has no answer.

We're the same person, he's about to say, but then Madara's wry smile flickers away and fades into darkness, and he's sitting on his clothes at his spot at the table, watching Tōka argue with his brother.

"- _were_ time-travel , then he'd have to be careful, because mayb-why is he naked? Why are you naked? What just happened?"

Tōka is confused, but Hashirama seems closer to childish excitement than anything else.

"Is it time-travel?" he asks, nearly bouncing on his seat.

Two sets of warm brown eyes regard him expectantly. Tobirama is hyper aware of the fact that he's absolutely naked.

"Yes," he says, and it feels a lot like defeat, "It is _time-travel_ ,"

* * *

Tobirama slams the door open so hard a set of decorative swords falls off the wall with a calamitous rattle, and the old woman inside the study lets out an undignified squeak.

"Tell me what you know of space-time seals!" he demands loudly.

Hikari-sensei looks at him for a second before letting out a mighty sigh, bending to pick up the scroll she dropped in her moment of fright.

"Good morning to you too, Tobirama. Why, yes I believe the weather's been lovely these past few days. Thank you for dropping by to see me for the first time in a month, child. Is there anything you'd like to know?" She puts her hands on her hips and looks up at him expectantly. The fact that she has to crane her neck nearly all the way back doesn't make it any less effective now than it was when he was a child, and had to look up at her.

Tobirama sighs, but hangs his head.

"... _Please_."

"That's more like it, boy." she says, cracking a smile, "Manners . If you dusted them off more often than twice a decade, you'd be married by now,"

He rolls his eyes.

"Good manners waste time," he scowls, then adds, "And I don't want to be married,"

The old woman snorts.

" _That_ is a bag of cats better left for another day." she says, cryptical as ever, and signals him to close the door and get inside. The room is tiny and circular, but the walls are filled floor to ceiling with shelves packed with scrolls and tomes of every color and size, "Now, space-time seals you say? I do believe I brought a scroll on space-time seals with me from Land of Whirlpools, but I also think you've already read it,"

Tobirama nods, crossing his arms over his chest, "It states the basics. Time bending for faster travel."

"But that's not what you're looking for," she says knowingly. Tobirama rakes his brain trying to find a way to explain himself without giving away too much.

"In the hypothetical case that a space-time seal was used to transport a person," he says, making it sound like a purely theoretical question, and not a very real problem, "Could there be...side effects?"

If she notices his thinly veiled avoidance, she doesn't point it out.

"Space time seals are tricky." Hikari-sensei nods sagely, reaching for a scroll from one of the lowest shelves and peering at the label, "One wrong move, and you could find yourself in several places at once. Cousin Shinichi accidentally drew an incomplete mark one time and teleported himself all the way to Land of Wind, minus his nose and ears. Nasty business,"

She cackles mirthfully like an old witch.

"That's a space problem," Tobirama points out, used to his old sensei's inappropriate sense of humour, "But what about a time problem?"

"Then you might find yourself temporarily misplaced," she says with a shrug, inspecting the contents of another, much thicker scroll and frowning, "That is why unique marks are to be used. One mark, one travel. Makes certain any consequence you might face are a one time thing. Why, old grandpa Kimchi used to tell the story of the one time he spent an afternoon battling lizards the size of mountains." she chuckles at Tobirama's raised eyebrow, "We always thought he'd just had too much sake, but then a few years after his death some folks in Land of Earth dug out ribcages big enough to put a house inside, buried under millennia of dirt and rubble,"

That...is not good. He was hoping he'd be told it is impossible, that time doesn't bend, pierce or break.

"...could it be a two time thing?" he asks, his voice much feebler than he intended.

Hikari-sensei looks up from her reading to raise a supremely unimpressed eyebrow at him, the one that lets him know that however good he might be at lying to other people he sucks at lying to her.

"In that case, _absolutely hypothetical_ as it is," she snorts,"the times would have to be linked. A particularly _stupid_ and _reckless_ shinobi would have left a mark behind. The mark would have to be there, calling out to you. Summoning you through time,"

Tobirama frowns. He didn't leave any marks behind. What the hell did she mean by that? That was the first time he ever used that mark! Granted, the mark had appeared in his mind as if by art of magic. Fate , Touka had said, but perhaps that word was too much. Perhaps he'd seen it before, and it had been branded in his mind, a quirky little mark that drifted uselessly through his thoughts until the day it appeared, unbidden, at the forefront of them. A simple coincidence.

But where the fuck had he seen it?!

"Linked times," he repeats, because maybe that's a part of the problem he can figure out, "What do you mean by that?" at her pointed look , he rolls his eyes, " _Hypothetically_ speaking,"

"Simply that. Linked," Hikari-sensei repeats, pushing locks of her flyaway silver hair behind her ear "By a place, perhaps. Or a particular object,"

Tobirama closes his eyes and concentrates on his breathing. No. Just... no. But alas, he's a man of logic, and no matter how hard he wants to deny the truth, hide away from it and never touch it, not even with a ten foot pole, he must confront it. And it's obvious, that's the worst part, and maybe if it weren't also supremely inconvenient and horrifying and just plain wrong, he would have seen it sooner.

Because in all three of his travels, there was only one common denominator.

"What about a person?" he asks, mentally recoiling from the notion.

Hikari-sensei's lips twitch, "Who?"

" _Hypothetically_?" he sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. He can definitely feel the migraine coming this time, " _Uchiha Madara_ ,"

Once Hikari-sensei finally finishes laughing herself silly, she hands him a handful of scrolls on time-space seals, a signed letter to her brother in Land of Whirlpools, pats his head, and laughs some more.

* * *

The rumour spreads around the compound like wildfire in the driest autumn.

Senju Tobirama, second in command of the Senju Clan, is time-traveling against his will. Naked.

Tobirama rolls his eyes at the murmurs and the stares, but lets them gossip all they want. Better they think he's been canoodling with the Sage of Six Paths than having them believe he's a deviant who enjoys running naked through the streets and stealing clothes from hanging lines.

In the weeks leading up to the journey to Land of Whirlpools, Tobirama travels so often he becomes used to it.

Most times, he manages to skip actually having to speak with Madara, when he manages to land somewhere off the boy's sight. He stays, hidden and silent, watching snippets of someone else's childhood that might as well be his own. The endless hours of training, the grueling lessons on strategy and politics and finance, the missions not meant for such young eyes-it's all familiar in an uncomfortable way.

Uchiha Madara entered the battlefield at an earlier age than Tobirama or even his brother did, and scaled up the positions at an even faster rate. The monstrous power combined with the sharp, agile mind made him a force to be reckoned with, and Tobirama remembers his name being whispered amongst the adults of his clan, awe and fear coloring their voices.

He remembers being five years old, remembers his father taking him and Hashirama to the empty aftermath of a battle field. He remembers the smell of charred flesh, bodies turned into nothing but coal, and the looks on the faces of the survivors. " _Wild child,_ " they'd whispered, and Tobirama had looked over the wasteland that had become of the forest, feeling the remnants of the corrosive chakra that permeated it, and shivered.

Tobirama looks at the child, _really_ looks at him, and it takes true effort not to kill him.

Other times, he travels and doesn't see Madara at all. He appears in the forest, kneeling next to a wooden toy shaped like a horse, or at a very familiar spot by the side of the river. The connection is always there, always calling him, like a string attached to his ribcage, right above his heart. Tobirama would love nothing more than to cut it, before he loses his mind.

* * *

Were Tobirama's sensor skills any lesser, he would jump in surprise at the sudden appearance of a large figure at the door of his brother's study

"The Uchiha have been quiet as of late," a gravely voice intones.

Senju Torou is a large, stoic faced man a good fifteen years older than Tobirama, clad perpetually in black armour seemingly designed to intimidate enemies into retreat. His stance is proud and fearless, and his angular face is fixed in a scowl that makes even battle hardened Senjus cringe when it's turned in their direction. In his childhood, Tobirama had been frightened of him, finally overcoming his unfounded, illogical fear at age thirteen.

At twenty-eight years old, they're losing faith that Hashirama ever will.

" _To-Torou-san_!" their Clan Head stammers, clattering to his feet and fixing wide eyes on their visitor, " _To-to-to what_ do we owe this visit?"

Torou raises a supremely unimpressed eyebrow, and repeats, deadpan, " _The Uchiha have been quiet as of late_ ,"

Tobirama noticed this as well. It is true that since his brother and Madara took charge of their respective clans, casualties have diminished considerably. The all-out war their fathers held against each other, and that dragged both clans nearly to ruins, ended with their death at each other's hand. Skirmishes these days are few and far in between, and only when both clans are hired by warring parties, but still-

Three months of silence is too much.

"Send four surveillance teams to scout the surroundings of the Uchiha compound for suspicious behaviour," he says, eyes narrowed, "Engage if necessary,"

"Two teams, each bearing a peace treaty. Do not engage," his brother counters, his tone broking no arguments. Torou bows respectfully and leaves.

Tobirama sighs "Brother…"

But Hashirama merely raises a hand, and the look of pained compassion he turns on Tobirama is enough to set the younger man's blood boiling. It's that look that says that his brother sees in him the second coming of their father, and he despairs.

"They've done nothing," he reminds him, tone pleading him to listen, to understand. Tobirama can't remember when it happened, but at some point his brother started using on him the same tone he uses on Madara.

Madara. The name brings to him images now that are different from the ones he's used too. Gone from his mind is the arrogant man with his bloodthirsty red eyes, the general with an army at his back and a power summoned from the depths of hell itself at his beck and call. Instead, there's the image of a little boy with wide onyx eyes peering at his face, wild black hair tumbling in the wind and red nose cold, because he's never dressed warm enough for the weather.

 _Wild child,_ a Senju soldier whispered over and over in his feverish state, over and over until he died.

His eyes had been delirious with pain, and the horror coiling within, more than the burns that consumed most of his body, were what remained with Tobirama for the longest time. He still sees them sometimes, if the nights are cold enough, and the smell of cooking meat still makes him gag and dry heave, if he's not expecting it.

He narrows his eyes at his brother, at his foolish hopes for innocence already lost, and hisses, " _Yet,"_

* * *

This time, he feels it coming. He's writing a missive to the Uzumaki Clan Head, asking permission to visit, and a hearing with a prominent elder by the name of Hisai Namikaze. He has enough time to set aside his brush so as not to spoil all his work before he finds himself kneeling on a forest floor, a branch digging painfully into his ankle. Naked and bleeding. Again . Marvelous.

The upbeat voice in the back of his head that sounds suspiciously like Hashirama points out that at least it's not snowing this time.

"Shut up," Tobirama growls at the voices in his own head.

"Hum. I didn't say anything,"

Tobirama looks up, startled. Looks like there won't be avoiding the kid this time.

Madara giggles and opens the scroll slung over his shoulder, activating the summoning seal with a sloppy flare of chakra. The same thick grey cloak from the first time materializes in his hands, and he throws it over Tobirama's head.

"You really should figure out a way to time travel with your clothes on, you know," the boy says, placing his hands on his hips, "I don't know what they think about it in the future, but adults from this time don't like grown men who show up naked in front of little boys. I know. I asked my father,"

Tobirama suppresses an inappropriate snort at the thought of Uchiha Tajima being asked that question by his little son. He also wonders who suffered his wrath for that particular crime.

"They don't like it in the future either," he limits himself to say, holding the cloak more securely to himself as he stands, "You told your father about me?"

Madara rolls his eyes, and sniffles, "No. For the millionth time, I didn't tell anyone. Having a naked time traveling friend with rabbit eyes is not really good for my reputation, you know,"

Another sniffle, and Tobirama wonders if no one ever explained to this kid the concept of weather appropriate clothes. Then he processes the part where Madara compared him to a rodent, and he glares. Because he's a little shit, the boy giggles.

"How old are you?" he asks, just to say something. Madara's intent stare could burn holes into a brick wall.

The boy puffs his chest and grins, "I'll be ten in three weeks!"

Ten. Tobirama does the math reflexively, before he can remind himself that that is a bad idea. That means that, somewhere out there, beyond this forest and the surrounding lands, Tobirama is seven years old, and his whole family is still alive.

He can remember, clear as morning air, his mother's smile, forever subdued and pained but bright nonetheless, her pale hair and crimson eyes exactly like his own. His father was different then, while she lived. Less angry, more willing to smile.

He remembers teaching Kawarama how to read, watching his little fingers trace the plain kanjis, while Itama slept in his crib, tired after a day of learning how to walk this world that was new for him. He remembers Hashirama, lying face down on the floor, dead to the world and snoring faintly, the comfort of their family life the only dream of peace he needed.

Somewhere out there.

Tobirama is assaulted by an onslaught of grief so powerful it makes him crumple to the ground, shaking and trying not to fall apart. Of all the moments to have a mentel breakdown that's been years in the making-

"Tobirama?" Madara is crouched beside him, his hand resting comfortingly on his back. "Are you okay?" he asks quietly as Tobirama dry heaves.

The boy kneels in front of him and peers into his face, concern widening peerless black eyes.

In the darkness of their depths, Tobirama sees Kawarama's coffin being lowered to the ground. He sees Uchiha Tajima's sword protruding from his father's chest. He sees his mother's corpse, her slit throat, the blood on the ground, and suddenly every breath he takes carries the smell of Itama's charred flesh, sickeningly sweet.

Uchiha .

"Why _you_?" Tobirama spits, eyes narrowing with anger and pain. The boy recoils a little, but doesn't scurry away, "Why _must I_ come back to _you_?"

Out of all the people in the world, why his sworn enemy? Why a member of the clan that burned most of his family to ash? Why the child who enamoured his brother and charmed him into believing in foolish dreams of hope and peace, only to leave him heartbroken and forever disappointed with life? Why the man whose name has forever meant strife and pain in Tobirama's mind, the greatest general of the Uchiha to date?

Why this child, so young and wide eyed, whose death would fix _so much?_

" _Oh_ ," Madara says suddenly. He throws his arms around Tobirama's shoulders, his face buried against the back of Tobirama's neck. The display shocks Tobirama so much that his mind goes blank, and in the second that follows he remembers to breathe. " _I'm so sorry_. About your family." Tobirama feels himself crack a little.

He stays for five more minutes, shellshocked and crumbling, and then materializes, thankfully, on the floor of his bedroom.

A whole day went by.

* * *

 **"It's only with the heart that one can see rightly. Anything essential is invisible to the eyes", is a quote from the Little Prince.**

 **Thank you for reading!**


	2. Touched by Destiny

The lake shimmers in the midday sun, undisturbed but for the occasional plopping sound as a fish breaks the surface, ripples widening out. Dragonflies hover dangerously close to the water, as if testing their skill, while butterflies and bees limit themselves to the wildflowers and thistle blossoms by the shore. On a patch of flattened long grass a little ways away, there are two children. Madara, who clearly had planned to be alone with his scrolls to get some reading done in the peaceful quiet of the lake, and Izuna, who foiled his plans by trailing after him, and is now dejectedly playing with a stick he fished out of the shallow water.

"Nii-san," the boy says suddenly, a troubled frown on his face, "why is the lake blue?"

Madara looks up from the scroll he's inspecting, and promptly answers, "Because it copies the sky,"

Izuna nods, momentarily satisfied. Madara returns to his scroll.

Less than a minute rolls by, then, "But why is the sky blue?" the younger boy demands.

Madara looks at him and blinks, concocting an answer.

"Because it's not purple," he finally decides, certainty lacing his every word. Izuna thinks about this, then nods solemnly, like it is the most logical piece of information he's ever received, and returns to his task of digging a hole in the dirt with a stick.

Tobirama is finding it difficult to believe that this is the same person that's come dangerously close to killing him on six separate occasions.

Uchiha Izuna, his longest standing and most respected opponent, whose tactical genius rivals, and at times even surpasses, his own; who can clear entire battlefields, raining fire and destruction upon his enemies without breaking a sweat; whose masterful swordsmanship is feared in all the five Great Nations, and admired by the samurai of the Land of Iron.

This Uchiha Izuna is small, articulate for his age, very interested in the way everything works, and hangs off his older brother's every word. He also has two short swords tied to his back, the handles sticking out over his shoulders for easy reach in battle. He killed Tōka 's brothers with those swords, when Tobirama was ten. She cried bitterly into Hashirama's shoulder while he futilely tried to soothe her through his own tears, and Tobirama looked at them and burned with impotence and rage.

"It would look better purple," Izuna comments, pausing on on his digging and looking up expectantly. Madara mumbles an agreement.

Both boys look almost exactly like they did the first time they crossed blades, that fateful day on the river. Three months after that, Tōka 's twelve year old twin brothers were left to bleed out on the battlefield, both kills efficient and seemingly effortless. The bodies were still aflame from Madara's final, massive katon, hurled across the field as a distraction while his men retreated, when they were found underneath piles of ash.

For all Tobirama knows, somewhere out there his cousins are still alive and well, terrorizing the compound with their pranks and bodily dragging him out of the library to force him to be the judge in another silly competition they organized. They're alive, and happy, but not for long. Not for long.

"Mother says that you need a haircut," Izuna comments. The stick has gone from being a shovel to becoming a bird, flying around as high as short arms can reach.

They're distracted, the both of them. They feel secure in the lands they deem to be their own, and neither noticed the disturbance in the air when Tobirama landed in the treeline, giving him enough time to suppress his chakra. They have no idea he's here, no one can see him, no one canknow.

His fingers itch to form the seals, a voice in his head telling him to just do it.

"I think I'll let it grow longer," Madara says, picking at the shoulder length tresses with his fingers.

Izuna drops his arms to his sides and gapes.

"But that's dangerous!"

It's true. Long hair is a hazard in a fight, essentially being a leash to be conveniently placed in an opponent's hand. Senju children are to keep their hair cropped as close to the skull as possible, to avoid catching fire when faced with Uchihas. Only the most skilled of fighters, or the most reckless ones, allow themselves such vanity.

Madara shrugs, and returns to his reading.

Izuna huffs, angry at the dismissal, and chews his lip. He mumbles a bit under his breath, apparently still at an age when he needs to vocalize his thoughts, and crosses his arms above his small ribcage. He's momentarily distracted from his grumble by a bumblebee steadily making it's way towards his brother's head, but instead of telling him, he just looks at the insect make it's way closer and closer to the distracted boy. When Madara sees it, he yelps and swats at it with the scroll, falling backwards trying to avoid it, glaring when the younger boy giggles delightedly at him.

Izuna sniggers for a little longer, and then he cocks his head to the side and makes his way to his brother, crouching next to him. He peers at the other's face, concentration slowly dawning into glee.

Madara looks up at him and makes a face, "What?!"

"Cousin Shin was right," and his delighted grin turns into teasing, "In a certain light, you really do look like a girl,"

Madara just stares at him, blinks once, then splutters.

"What," he says flatly, not even a question. Izuna laughs, backs away swiftly just in time to avoid his brothers clutching hands reaching for him, and breaks into a dead run across the still surface of the lake. Madara jumps to his feet, scroll tumbling to the ground with a thud, and follows in hot pursuit.

"IZUNA!" he bellows, heavy feet splattering water all over his clothes,"Come back here so I can kill you!"

The younger boy, whose more refined chakra control allows him to stay dry, hoots with laughter, "Why would I do that?!"

"It'll hurt less than if I have to catch you!"

Izuna just laughs and laughs, feet skittering over the water and barely making a sound. After a ten minute race, filled with taunts and insults, Madara falls on his face with a painful sounding splat, one of his arms slipping dangerously under.

"Well?" Izuna asks, breathing heavily. "Weren't you going to catch me?"

But Madara doesn't answer. His body sinks a little bit more, until he's floating face down.

"Nii-san?" Izuna's expression shifts, and he rushes to his side, "Nii-san! Are you o-EEK!"

Madara grabs his brother's foot with his submerged hand and pulls him all the way under with a huge splash.

"Nii-san! " Izuna cries once he can finally get his head above water. The older Uchiha looks down at him with a grin.

"Will you ever not fall for that?" he asks laughingly, then his grin turns menacing. "Now, now. I believe I said I'd kill you, right?"

Izuna bravely tries to swim away, although it's more like an underwater flail, but gets caught, and after numbly watching Madara dunk the younger boy's head in the lake repeatedly for a good fifteen minutes, Tobirama's limbs start tingling. The children and the lake fade away, and he lands on his bed, his room swathed in sunlight from the open window, his hands still burning with chakra and the intent to kill.

There's children playing somewhere outside, laughing delightedly, and usually the sound would be enough to lift his spirits. But not today.

He closes the curtains, hides under the covers, and doesn't come out until it's time for dinner.

…

The boat ride is long and miserable, but as soon as Tobirama steps off the wooden deathtrap and onto the harbour, he wants to get back on it and return home. Land of Whirlpools, apparently located five miles from the surface of the sun, is the hottest, most humid place in the world, and the mosquitoes are ferocious.

"The weather here is _ridiculous_ ," Hashirama moans. His usually straight, tame hair is frizzy and sticking out in every direction, and he looks miserable. Serves him right. He's the one who wouldn't listen to reason and tagged along despite Tobirama telling him not to, reminding him that they couldn't just go and leave the country at the same time, they have a clan to manage, damnit. But reasoning with his brother is useless at the best of times, headache-inducing at the worst, and the truth is that Tobirama is not feeling at his best, these days.

His usually even temper is stretched thin, he's tired of being yanked back and forth through time, his sanity is in tatters, and the heat is not helping. If there's even a small chance that someone in this blasted island can tell him how to fix this, then his clan will have to deal.

Hopefully, the Uchiha will remain quiet for as long as this trip takes, and even if someone decides to attack them, he has absolute faith in Tōka's ability to make them regret it. He cringes at the thought of Tōka also being in charge of the food supply for as long as they're gone, but figures that if the clan survived Hashirama's incompetent management through those three months Tobirama spent as a captive of the Inuzuka, they can survive anything. There'd been actual tears, when Tobirama resumed his post. Someone even baked a cake, out of the very last cup of flour and eggs pilfered from a sparrow's nest.

So, the clan will be fine.

"Carry me," Hashirama says, leaning against him.

His brother, however, might not survive this trip.

"I will not," Tobirama says, trying to shift him away and unto Torou, their only other companion. The man gives him a look as if to say, you should have thought better before being born in his family, and pointedly takes a step back.

"But I'm tired and didn't sleep at all last night," Hashirama whines and leans harder. Tobirama knows this is true. He's the one that had to hold Hashirama's hair back as he lost his entrails over the side of the ship, and that image is not leaving his mind's eye anytime soon.

"The walk will wake you up," he states, trying to lean away, but it's hopeless.

In the end it's carry Hashirama or drag him by a foot, so Tobirama plops him up piggyback and walks the 3 and one half miles from the harbour into the tiny village of Harō with a sleeping Clan Head drooling on his shoulder and an imposing bodyguard in full battle regalia by his side. This development increases the usual amount of gawks and stares they receive when visiting foreign lands.

Tobirama adds to his mental favorites collection one elderly woman, who was sitting outside her house sharpening tools, who looks up when they walk by, and rubs her eyes. She follows their progress down the road by leaning over further and further from her sitting position and keeps rubbing her eyes every few seconds.

They make their way through town undisturbed. Land of Whirlpools is a tiny country populated almost entirely by fishers and farmers, with a modestly numbered shinobi clan scattered here and there, but the village of Harō is different from most villages here. Harō happens to be the home of one of the most prominent shinobi clans in the country and so, however entertained the villagers might be by the sudden visitors, they know better than to push their luck with foreign ninja, no matter how ridiculous they might appear upon first glance.

Eventually, they stand in what might be the town square, but it's hard to tell. It looks more like a deposit for the town livestock, a playground for pests and a general health hazard. A young lady pauses in her chore of grooming an imposing grey stallion to regard them evenly for a second, then she snorts, and returns to her business, seemingly impervious to the mosquitoes flying around her head.

He jostles Hashirama on his back.

" _Anija_ , wake up,"

"No," is the petulant reply.

" _Anija_ , wake up so I can set you down,"

"No," and the arms around Tobirama's neck tighten.

" _Anija_ , wake up or I'm going to back up to one of those interesting brown piles that goat just left and drop you,"

"Fine," Hashirama says, sighing like Tobirama is being ridiculously unfair, "I'm awake."

Tobirama sets him on his feet, gives him a few seconds to rub his eyes and sulk sleepily, and then he pushes him toward a local, who predictably stopped to gawk. He feels sort of bad inflicting Hashirama on the man this early in the morning, but after the third time swatting at a mosquito that just won't get away from his face, he decides that misery loves company.

"Good morning, friend!" Hashirama says, smile bright and gaining wattage by the second as he blinks away sleep, "I would ask for your help, if you would be so kind!"

The man looks at them for a minute, as if thoroughly satiating his curiosity, and then he leaves without even a grunt of acknowledgement. Hashirama blinks at the space the man vacated, likely wondering when he lost his divine power to make people love him on sight. Then he realizes he's being bitten by a mosquito and slaps his face so hard he leaves a hand-shaped red mark on it.

He looks at Tobirama forlornly, pout firmly in place. He looks dangerously close to tears, and it's too early in the morning for this.

"You'll never get anything out of them like that," the young lady says then, having paused once again just to watch Hashirama fail epically in his quest for information, leveling him with a supremely unimpressed look, "You can't just ask for it. You have to impose. Like this. Observe"

She clears her throat delicately, then turns to an unsuspecting man walking by.

"Hey YOU," she points at the hapless local, who's startled into nearly dropping the large watermelon he's carrying under his arm, "Yes, you, don't look behind you! Don't even think about trying to run before I wring every last bit of information from you that I can! I'm not playing around here, oh you might try to run but I'm faster, I might not look it but you haven't seen me chasing geese, and see this guy behind me," she jerks her thumb back at Torou, who raises an eyebrow, "he's even faster than me, and see all these-these things there," she flails wildly but is supposedly indicating the spikes on Torou's armour, polished to a glimmer in the morning sun, "he's also _pointy_. And _sharp_. So if you ran and we had to chase you, why there isn't any guarantee big and pointy here might not trip and land on you and OH I would so not want to be you if that happened. Swiss cheese would have less holes than you. So stay put, listen up, and spill!"

" ... _please_ ," Hashirama adds weakly behind her.

It takes them less than 3 minutes to find out who is sleeping with who, who ran off with whose wife, who's hidden half their goats in the woods to avoid paying taxes for them and oh yes, Old Man Hisai? Why he lives right up this hill. Can I go now ma'am please?

Tobirama is suitably impressed. Hashirama is closer to stupidly in love.

"Thank you, my lady," he says, and looks like he's three seconds away from doing something eminently stupid, like asking for her hand in marriage, "This will probably sound sudden to you, but I beg you not to be offended, for my motives are pure. My name is Hashirama, and I would ask for your-Omph!"

"-Name," Tobirama quickly interjects, stepping swiftly in front of his brother, who's clutching at his stomach and wheezing for breath, "He would ask for your name,"

The lady's lips twitch minutely, but she doesn't comment. She swiftly mounts her stallion in a flare of skill, grace and tumbling red hair, and simply says,"Mito,"

He bows respectfully, "We thank you for your help, my lady,"

He watches her horse disappear into town. In the background, Torou pats Hashirama on the back while he chokes and gags, his vertebrae rattling like beads on a bracelet with each forceful slap.

"There was no need to elbow me so hard, Tobirama," he scolds once he can finally speak again, but the swollen mosquito bite on his nose and the red imprints of his own digits on his face take away the seriousness of it,"What's the point of being Clan Head if I can't marry the woman I love?"

Tobirama doesn't sigh, but only because if he did he'd have to take a big breath after, and he's carefully not breathing more than strictly necessary. The air here is thick like warm soup. His brother doesn't seem to mind much anymore. His eyes are fixed, comically wide, on the road Mito followed minutes ago, and he looks wistful, the poor fool.

"You just met her," Tobirama tells him as he begins walking down the dirt road they were told to follow, but it's hopeless.

"Oh, you don't understand the heart, Tobirama!" he claims, walking backwards to look at him as he speaks, increasing his chances of tripping on a pebble and cracking his skull. Tobirama pictures it in excruciating detail, just to keep himself from strangling the idiot, "She's so beautiful! And-and-"

"Scary?" Torou suggests, looking amused.

"Yes, thank you!" he grins.

"Seems like your type," Tobirama agrees. Factoring in the the months of Hashirama's adolescent crush for their cousin Tōka, and the layered feelings the man has for one particular Uchiha, he might not be far from the truth.

"Oh, that we could stay in this beautiful place for a little while longer," Hashirama laments, swatting a horde of mosquitoes away. He takes a final step backwards, and trips on a rock.

Tobirama is dispassionately watching his brother fall to sprawl on the dirt, when he feels his stomach churn and the world fade away again. He has a distinct moment to think that at least his brother's wish is granted, they're staying in this horrible place for an indefinite amount of time, before he finds himself kneeling on the grass in the middle of the Uchiha compound.

" _Uh-oh_ " a roughly ten year old Madara says, eyes wide. There's a smudge of dirt on his cheek, and a horde of curious children behind him, peeking at the naked man who appeared out of thin air in the middle of the playground.

Madara manages to take off his haori and throw it at him before Tobirama finds himself chased by a throng of outraged Uchiha women wielding kunais, swords, and enough firepower to level a country, holding the small cloth around his middle as he's called a pervert and a fiend in a dozen different, increasingly inventive ways.

He fucking hates time travel.

…

A week later, Tobirama is seated at the Uzumaki Clan Head's table, eating scalding ramen whose only purpose seems to be making his insides the same temperature as the outside world.

"It is always a pleasure having you with us, Hashirama-dono," Uzumaki Ashina says pleasantly, bowing as best as he can when sitting down,"As well as any member of the Senju clan,"

Which is the polite way of saying he doesn't remember Tobirama's name. Next to him, Torou snorts into his soup, and Tobirama prays that he'll choke on it.

"It is a pleasure to be here, as always," Hashirama says, even though he's sweating profusely and his hair looks like a bird's nest, and they've been here a grand total of three times, "Such a lovely, ovely place,"

He says it like if he infuses his tone with enough politeness it'll magically come true. He's saved from having to lie some more by the entrance of Uzumaki Mito, who instantly commands all of his attention and fucks up his ability to string coherent sentences together.

"Forgive my lateness, father," she says, taking a seat at a vacant spot next to Tobirama. Across from him, Hashirama slumps his shoulders dejectedly. His sulking is nearly audible, "I was busy with the horses, you see. They're quite rattled , for whatever reason,"

Tobirama suppresses a groan and focuses on his soup.

"Oh," the old man blinks, wiping his bushy mustache clean of soup, "Rattled, you say? Perhaps they saw something that irked them,"

"A snake, perhaps," Hashirama says, nodding sagely, "Or a mouse."

Tobirama growls low in his throat, but they ignore him. Torou sniggers.

"Perhaps," Mito shrugs, feigning nonchalance, then says in an overly dramatic tone, "Or perhaps it was _The Time Traveling Naked Man."_

They laugh like this is not the thousandth time they've made that joke in the past day, since Tobirama landed on a pile of waste in the stables and scared the shit out of the animals. Literally.

Since it's generally considered impolite to murder people in their own dinner room, Tobirama limits himself to a vitriolic panoramic glare.

"Forgive me, Tobirama-san," Mito says, wiping her eyes daintily as her mirth dies down, "It's just that funny things are few and far in between these days, you understand,"

"Funny," he growls, " is a matter of perspective,"

Across from him, his brother continues to snigger. Tobirama kicks him on the shin once, and calmly takes a sip of his soup.

"Ah, yes." Mito says, watching Hashirama crumple in his seat with mirth dancing in her eyes, "I would think so,"

Tobirama likes her more and more with each passing minute.

"I assure you, my friend, your problem will be solved soon," Ashina says, a kind smile on his elderly face,"There's no one in the world as skilled in time-space seals as Namikaze-sensei . Why, he used to be considered the fastest man in the world!"

"His jutsu was swift and efficient, and some said he could even be at two places at once," Mito nods,"They used to call him the Yellow Lightning Bolt, "

Torou raises an eyebrow, "Used to? "

"One day, he just...stopped using it. He didn't give any reasons, he just stopped . No matter who asked him to, he wouldn't teach his secrets, and soon he even stopped coming to town," Mito explains. Torou simply nods and returns to his food, clearly dismissing them from his attention, having apparently used up all his words for the day.

"What happened?" Tobirama asks, used to his subordinate's mannerisms.

Ashina makes an all encompassing gesture with his chopsticks, sending soup and noodles flying everywhere.

"Perhaps he realized that swiftness cannot solve all problems, or he figured out that there is more to life than simply increasing it's speed." the old man shrugs, "Maybe he just had to come to terms with the fact that the Grey Haired Lightning Bolt doesn't have the same ring to it. In any case, we don't see him much anymore"

Tobirama frowns. That is not very reassuring.

"Will he help?" Hashirama asks then, resurfacing from his endorphin-induced stupor. It's easy for him to forget how worried his brother is by all this, with the jokes and everything, but Hashirama is serious now. This last trip ate up a week from Tobirama's life.

Ashina shrugs again, and limits himself to say,"You lose nothing by trying,"

And try they will. This is the only lead they have, possibly the only lead they'll ever have: space-time seals are only ever used on objects, never people, and never with these kind of adverse side effects. Members of the Namikaze family are the only ones recorded to have used jutsus similar to the one Tobirama used, it was their exploits he was studying when he came across the Hiraishin , and Namikaze Hisai is the most prominent of them all. If he can't,or won't, help-

Hashirama looks at him over the table, jaw set and eyes determined. It's a look Tobirama is familiar with. It's a look that says, I'm not letting anyone take your quills again, and No one will ever harm you, and No more children will die. His brother has that look on his face that says whatever problem has come up, he'll beat it into submission or out stubborn it into giving up. He's committed.

Tobirama barely keeps himself from laughing, but even against his better judgement, he can't help but feel a bit reassured. That look, after all, has only ever meant good things.

Shaking his head, he returns to his meal.

"I shall retire for the night." Ashina says then, pushing away his empty plate and rising to his feet. Everyone at the table rises as well, except for Mito, who continues to eat with the kind of single-mindedness everyone in her family seems to reserve only for ramen. After bowing respectfully, they all sit down once more to finish their meal.

"Tobirama-dono, I would appreciate it if you wouldn't show up naked in my quarters." the old man says then.

When Tobirama widens his eyes at him, he winks cheekily.

Cheekily.

"I'm a vigorous man, but that would be too much for my frail old heart, I should think,"

Tobirama splutters, but the old man is already gone. Hashirama chokes on a noodle laughing himself silly, and it takes true effort _not_ to let him die.

…

He lands face down just outside the Senju Compound, loose dirt going straight up his nostril, thankfully hidden by bushes and tallgrass. He suppresses a sneeze and his chakra as soon as he can, lest his younger self will know of his presence, and raises his eyes just in time to see his brother run past towards the guarded gate. He's visibly rattled, hurrying on his way home from his first meeting with Madara, carrying with him a helmet emblazoned with the Hagoromo crest.

Someone is waiting for him at the entrance.

He watches, entranced, as his brother runs to a boy whose back is turned to Tobirama. His breath catches in his throat and he lowers his face to the dirt, allowing himself to only catch a glimpse of white and brown hair, all on the same head and combed methodically, nearly obsessively apart because _when the colors mix it just looks wrong, don't you see? Of course you don't know. You're so lucky you have normal hair, I have to walk around looking like a panda bear. Don't call me panda bear! Just because I said it doesn't mean you get to say it. I hate you sometimes, Tobirama._

His limbs start tingling and he fades away before he can tell if the boy who turns around is Itama or not.

He tells himself it isn't. It's easier that way.

...

The house is leaning to the right. Hashirama and Tobirama lean too, just to make sure they are looking at it correctly.

"You stay here," he tells his brother, who is sweltering in the heat and barely coherent. He makes a face that Tobirama interprets as assent and continues staring blearily at nothing as Tobirama makes his way to the door.

Tobirama knocks a couple of times. Then he knocks a few more, then he pounds, and then he freezes because the porch creaks ominously. But the door opens and the man standing there, small, old, bald but for a tuft of grey hair, and hunched over his cane, squints at the young man and smiles.

With a lot of coaxing, the brothers manage to fit in the tiny living space despite the claustrophobically low ceiling and excess of furniture. When Tobirama and Hashirama both go to sit on the little sofa, it lets out a mighty moan and so Hashirama, ever considerate of the neglected majority of inanimate objects' feelings, sits on the floor.

"It's my lucky day to have such fine young visitors," the old man says, smiling a toothless smile, "I should make you some tea, I think," and he starts to stand, his movements painfully slow.

"Oh, no, sir," Hashirama says, and gets to his feet. The floorboards wobble threateningly, "let me do it, I'd be happy too."

"That would be very nice. And they say the youth of today are so lazy, but I don't see it. I don't see it at all. Thank you, young man," the old man grins again. Hashirama beams at him, then negotiates the walk from sitting room to kitchen like a soldier navigating a minefield, but he makes it safely and Tobirama can hear his brother's content hum as he goes about inspecting the old man's kitchen.

"Now," the old man says, drawing Tobirama's eyes back to him, "Just what can I do for the two of you?"

"Well, sir," Tobirama says politely, because his mother taught him manners and he is grateful to drag them out when the occasion calls for it, "My name is Senju Tobirama, from the Land of fire. I'm Hikari Namikaze's disciple." at this, he fishes the Hikari-sensei's letter from his pocket and hands it over.

The old man opens it, glimpses at the contents, snorts haughtily and puts it away, before doing a familiar hand gesture, urging Tobirama to move along already. Well then.

"My brother and I, we've come across some information about you, about…" how to word it properly? "About who you used to be,"

"Ah," the old man says, sitting back on the chair, "you mean my dear sister and little Ashina have told you about my exploits with space-time jutsus,"

"Yes, sir,"

"And why is it that a fine young man such as you would be interested in an old man's accomplishments?"

"I had a... problem," is what he settles for after some deliberation, knowing that if the old man's genius is as grand as he's been told then he'll figure it out on his own, "with a space-time jutsu,"

The old man leans forward and peers at him with wide, sky blue eyes, and that is a first class gawk.

"Ah, yes," he says, nodding, "You have that misplaced air about yourself. Marks you as a time traveler,"

He settles back on his chair and grins like it's the most normal thing in the world.

Tobirama gapes, "What."

Hashirama comes back then, carefully carrying some teacups and using a plate as a make shift tray. He sits them down then slowly navigates his way back to the kitchen.

"Oh, yes," Hisai says, shrugging, "It is a rather...bothersome side effect of the space-time jutsu," he shrugs, "Happens sometimes. Tends to wear off,"

Tobirama grits his teeth so hard they squeak,"It is a little bit more bothersome than that,"

"Ah," the old man says sympathetically, "The naked part is giving you trouble, isn't it?"

"Well, yes," Tobirama barks, losing his patience, "That, and the fact that it isn't wearing off,"

Hisai seems not to notice.

"Did you happen to leave your mark behind, on your first travel?" he asks pleasantly, "The Hiraishin mark never disappears,"

"I didn't leave anything behind," Tobirama sighs, running a hand over his face,"It just keeps pulling me back ,"

"To a place?"

He grimaces, "To a person,"

This seems to strike something in the old man, because he sits up straight and frowns, his face seemingly completely unused to the expression. Tobirama notices the sudden change in attitude, but doesn't let it show, "To their past, or their future?"

"Both, I think. But I was there, too. In their future," he frowns, remembering the future version of himself he- -thinks -he saw, remembers his easy posture, and the way he'd turned his back on an enemy. He crosses his arms over his chest so that his clenched fists are less obvious, and growls, "But it's not possible ,"

A fixture of his imagination is all that it was. There is simply no possibility he , or any version of him , would ever be so calm when turning his back on an Uchiha. No matter the context, it's outrageous to even remember the image. The only reason he knows the whole thing wasn't a genjutsu is that no one, not Izuna and not Madara, would be foolish enough to believe he'd fall for such a thing.

Oblivious to the rage and turmoil once again threatening Tobirama's calm, the old man keeps talking.

"Ah." he says, scratching his chin thoughtfully, "Your...let us call it chronological impairment, shall we? It seems to be pointing you somewhere, don't you think?"

Tobirama raises an eyebrow and stares blankly at the man, who simply chuckles.

"I'm a man of logic, just as you are." he states amiably, looking over the various tomes and scrolls scattered about the small living space, stacked on top of every available surface, "But some things-logic can't really explain them, can it?"

Tobirama rolls his eyes, "Fate, then, you mean?"

Everyone who knows, from Hikari-sensei to his brother and Ashina-san, everyone has tried to imbue this-this side effect with some kind of otherworldly, larger than life meaning. If Tobirama'd ever though life's questions and the problems of the world could be solved with concepts as vague as fate , he would have devoted his life to scripture and the Gods instead of research and war.

He wonders, if they knew what he sees everytime he travels, would they still believe fate is in anyway involved? What would Hashirama say, if he knew it's his beloved soulmate he sees everytime he's yanked through space-time? Would Tōka still maintain her advice, would she still tell him not to interfere, if she knew who Tobirama is drawn to like moth to a flame? Because what else could fate be telling him to do , other than to cut the problem by the root, and obliterate his enemy before his time comes to pass?

-Madara and Izuna gliding over the water, laughing together under the sun, distracted distracted distracted-

No. This isn't fate. This is cruel chance and fortuity, this is the powers-that-be laughing as Tobirama struggles not to sullen the last of the light he has left by murdering a child. This is himself, bound by a foolish mistake to a creature , trembling with the effort to hold himself still because Uchiha Madara-young and defenceless-is always right there.

Playing with wooden swords, learning the skills that will make him deadly, that will keep his family safe. Always cold and trying not to show it, splashing water and answering questions about the sky and the water and smiling so freely-

 _-onyx eyes looking down upon the battlefield with a sneer, hair a mass of constant black tumbling in the wind, the bodies littering the floor by the dozen, by the hundreds, by the thousands, smothered under piles of ash that used to be people. Burning skin and meat falling from the bone, smell sweet and nauseating, gurgling screams and mercy deaths. Wild child, wild child, wild child-_

"Have you spoken to this person?" Hisai asks, snapping him from his reverie, "Asked them-about what they remember?"

Tobirama is shaking his head before the question is even finished, swallowing back the acrid taste in the back of his throat brought on by the memories, "There's no way for me to approach them,"

The old man winces, expression tumbling into sympathetic, "They're dead, then?"

"No," Tobirama corrects, sighing. All his problems would be lesser if that were true, "but-we are enemies,"

Shattering the solemn aura that had shaped itself around them, the old man laughs heartily, clutching at his belly and wheezing for breath. At Tobirama's raised eyebrow and impassive expression, he settles down a bit, only to burst out laughing once more time.

"You're oddly reticent of destiny, for someone so profoundly touched by it," he says, grinning widely and still sniggering. There's tears at the corners of his eyes, his blue eyes seemingly becoming liquid, but he sobers up enough to level Tobirama with an almost self-deprecating smile, "The trouble with time is that it often makes us forget ourselves,"

"...what?"

The old man chuckles again, shaking his head in what looks like mystification mixed with deep sadness. The change of humour is sudden and unexpected, and it's enough to throw Tobirama for a loop.

"Nothing, child. You are young yet. There is no need for you to concern yourself with issues beyond your years," his voice cracks slightly, be it by age or feeling, but he smiles again, tiny and sad, every line on his face brought to stark relief. He remembers Mito's words, One day, he just...stopped.

"This person, their present-tense self…" Hisai says, once again smiling placidly and leaning back on his seat. For a moment, Tobirama is nearly overwhelmed by curiosity, and he wonders what makes a man like this abandon his life's work, his art, his passion , to live all but secluded on top of a hill. It just-doesn't seem right.

What made you stop?, he wants to ask, a stab of anxiety burning through his side. What made you stop, so that I can avoid it?

"Are they hot?"

Tobirama blinks several times, then asks feebly, "Are they ...what? "

Hisai just continues to smile placidly, shrugging one shoulder at Tobirama's expression of slowly dawning horror.

"Oh, you know. Hot." he says, mirth dancing in his eyes, "Inviting, provocative, seductive... arousing,"

Tobirama's brain screeches to a halt, then throws itself of a cliff, and he chokes on air. The old man sniggers like a schoolboy.

It is a good thing Hashirama returns then with the cream and sugar bowl and notices his brother turning blue. A few hard raps on the back make him gag and choke and start breathing again, his brain trying to climb back up to the control tower.

Hisai laughs delightedly, shaking his head.

"What are you-why-who- what?! " Tobirama wheezes, having just cheated death, as the back pounding continues.

"It's where fate seems to be pointing you,"

So this whole thing would be some kind of demented, twisted attempt to get him to-to-

He opens his mouth to say something very affronted, and possibly very rude, only for Hashirama to clamp his hand over his mouth.

"I think my brother doesn't agree with that, sir," his brother says politely. Tobirama glares at him and has the distinctly childish need to lick his palm.

"Oh, well. If you want to fight fate so desperately," the old man says with a shrug, then he scratches his chin,"I seem to remember some journals I used to keep…they might prove useful to you"

"Where are they?!"Tobirama hisses, having given in and freed his mouth by licking Hashirama's palm. The man stands speechless, staring at the appendage with horror and disgust.

"Eh? Hmmm, let me think," the old man says.

"I'll get the teapot!" Hashirama says excitedly, because tea always makes good things happen, plus he needs to wash his hand with lye.

Tobirama waits. Hashirama returns with the teapot, pours the old man a cup and hovers nervously at his elbow, but the old man says nothing further. In fact he goes completely still as well. The brothers look at each other. They decide to wait it out.

Still, the old man seems to ponder silently.

Still a while later, Hashirama finally ventures: "Do you think he's alive?"

"I don't know," Tobirama sighs miserably, massaging his temples,"Why don't you check?"

Hashirama, 28 years old or not, tested warrior or not, leader of a clan or not, isn't about to touch a potentially dead old person.

"No," he says, backing away, "You check."

Tobirama glares.

As they stare at each other, each trying to will the other to do it, the old man speaks as if he'd never stopped speaking to begin with.

"I seem to remember they might be in the study," he says, and calmly sips his tea.

Hashirama jumps to his feet, a bouncing ball of energy.

"Do you hear that, Tobirama?! They're in the st…." and Hashirama crashes through the floor,"... ow ."

He gets his usual damage assessment.

"He landed on his head," Tobirama says calmly, "he's not hurt."

Mokuton proves extremely useful, when they fix the floor.

…

"Lady Mito, you hold my heart," Hashirama states, voice heavy with feeling. He's kneeling on the pier, holding one of her hands in both of his own, looking up at her with a mixture of awe and adoration mutts generally reserve for their owners. It is painful to watch.

"Really." Lady Mito states, unimpressed. Tobirama wants to dump his brother in this god forsaken island and name her Clan Head. His life would beso much easier.

"It's like watching a house cat being ripped apart by a wild beast," Torou says, mystified,"I really don't want to watch, but I can't help myself ,"

In the end, they have to drag Hashirama bodily into the boat and restrain him so that he'll stop making a fool of himself.

There's muted screaming coming from the boat, a constant litany of things like _You are an executioner of love, Tobirama!._ And _I will return, my sweet, fear not for you are the only one! T_ hen something that sounds suspiciously like _TOROU-SAN WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO WITH TH-_ followed by a dull clanging sound. Then there is silence, the calming rumble of the waves crashing against the shore, and the poorly concealed giggles of the crew and the villagers that had stopped to gawk.

"My apologies," Tobirama says, bowing respectfully.

"Unnecessary," she waves it away, then shrugs. "He's... amusing,"she says it like the older man is a particularly pestering puppy, or someone else's quirky child, both tolerated merely for the entertainment value. Tobirama really, really likes her. "Have you found what you came here for?"

He thinks about the leather bound journals stacked in his bag, all four of them a collection of research notes, journal entries, letters, recipes and an alarming amount of lewd drawings."I...do not know for sure. I hope I have,"

She hums and looks over the horizon, following the path of seagulls with dark blue eyes. He's transfixed for a second by how beautiful she is, this warrior child of warriors, how young, even though she's probably his age, if not a bit more. The Uzumaki are known for their longevity, yet Ashina is the oldest one left, all his children but Mito dead or missing, the fire in their eyes extinguished for good. Much like his own brothers, they were born to die.

She probably won't live to be an old woman like her father, or Hisai. She won't live to test that renowned longevity. That is a sad notion in on itself, and for a split second Tobirama burns with a sudden rage at the injustice, because she should.

Then she looks at him and smiles.

"I believe you have," she says, and winks.

He's left on the pier staring after her, wondering what she could possibly mean by that.

…

One minute Tobirama is staring blankly at the midnight sky, holding his brother's hair back as the man throws up over the side of ship, and the next he's kneeling on an ant nest large enough to have it's own government system, complete with three powers, a vast amount of redundant public servants and subterranean anterooms containing nothing but large stacks of paperwork. At the sudden invasion of a large naked man, the ants attack. Tobirama doesn't scream, but it's a very near thing.

He jumps back as far away from the thing as possible, directing freezing jets of water to his legs with a jutsu before blindly and violently scrubbing them with his hands, so that if the ants don't fall off at least they'll die drowned or crushed. Once he's satisfied that he won't get bitten by tiny, disgusting insects, he glares at the nest. If he could he'd set it on fire.

Though he's never been a very outdoorsy person-he's always preferred to stay in, which set him apart from the other boys in his clan since childhood-Tobirama's never outright hated the forest until now that he has to spend so much time unclothed in the wild. Didn't this kid have a house? Although, considering the fiasco that travel that landed him smack in the middle of the Uchiha compound was, maybe it's better that he shows up where there's no one around. His head still hurts from that one frying pan that connected with his skull.

It's late at night, and it's cold. The stars are out, and the moon shines bright upon the earth, bathing it in silvery light that's enough to see by. Tobirama feels the little monster nearby, alone in a clearing minutes away, and he contemplates his options. This could be a short trip, and since the boy hasn't seen him, he can just wait it out and not have to see him at all. On the other hand, the trip might not be short, since it's been proven that they can be quite long and last for several hours, it's cold, and he's naked. And wet. With a sigh, he starts walking.

He can tell the second that Madara notices he's around. There's a jolt in his chakra, monstrous as it is, like an uptick in his heartbeat that makes his control snap minutely, and then there's tiny tendrils of raw power reaching out gingerly outwards. He wonders where the boy learnt how to do that, since Tobirama isn't aware of any sensor Uchihas, but that kind of chakra control needs to be taught. He saves that piece of information to look into it later.

As soon as he's within reach, a scroll comes flying towards him, aimed perfectly at the centre of his face. He's seen it before, it's the standard summons one where Madara carries Tobirama's coat, which is a strange thought in on itself. Glaring at the situation in general, he activates it and wraps the warm fur around himself. It fits perfectly, which only annoys him even more.

Madara is sitting on a log by a small fire, the spartan camp signaling he's either going on a mission or returning from one. His black stallion is just as impassive upon Tobirama's sudden appearance as it was the last time, but this time there's a large quilt thrown over it that comes up almost to it's ears, and it's steady puffs of breath are visible in the cold air as it regards him calmly, used to his presence. The very thought is disturbing.

"Are you having a staring match with Yoru?" Madara asks nonchalantly then, looking up at him with eyes blacker than the night, "I should warn you, though, he's one of the quiet ones. You know what they say about those,"

Tobirama snorts, raising a hand to pat the horse's warm flesh. It presses it's head eagerly into his hand, like he's done that a million times before.

Eeery.

" _Night_ , huh?" he mutters, giving in and scratching the animal between the ears, "Rather unimaginative name for a black horse,"

"Izuna wanted to call him _Super Fire Hooves Ultra Spirally Sharp-san,_ " Madara pipes in.

Tobirama raises a questioning eyebrow.

"He was five," he shrugs, "It was that or _Buttercup_. Father said that those names weren't acceptable for a war horse, and called him Yuro. Izuna got so mad, he held his breath until he passed out. I think he still calls him that, in his head,"

"Super Sharp Fire Hooves-san?"

" _Super Fire Hooves Ultra Spirally Sharp-san_ ," Madara corrects without missing a beat, then rolls his eyes, "This is my brother we're talking about. Of course he calls the horse _Buttercup_ ,"

Tobirama has a hard time imagining Uchiha Izuna being capable of even saying that word, but the thought still makes him chuckle. He's freezing and the fire seems to call for him, so he sheds his doubts and sits by it on another log placed next to the one Madara's sitting on. He toys with the idea that Madara placed it there just in case he'd show up, and discards it as ridiculous.

"Why are you wet?"

Tobirama mentally flails for an answer, but settles on an evasive, "It was raining in the future,"

The boy looks at him, and Tobirama discovers that the Absolutely Underwhelmed by Your Nonsense Uchiha Look is actually something the youngsters hone into perfection.

"From the ground _up_?", little shit that he is, Madara grins, "There were bugs and you panicked, didn't you?"

How the hell does this boy know so much about him?!

"It is none of your business," he grits out, glaring at the giggling boy, "Why are you out in the cold anyway?"

At this, the laughter stops, to be replaced by a sullen silence as the boy looks away from him and at the crackling fire. Tobirama keeps glaring, because he'll be damned if he's going to let Uchiha Madara make him feel guilty, eleven year old or else.

"Well?" he demands sternly. The boy sighs, rubbing at his red-rimmed eyes. The bags under them are more pronounced than usual, they're closer to what his adult counterpart usually sports, and the thought is jarring, for some reason.

"I did something terrible," he confesses in a whisper, looking like he's waiting to be struck down by some invisible force, but not by Tobirama. This familiarity the boy has with him tells him that he's visited him a lot more times than he's comfortable with.

Madara keeps talking,"I cheated on a mission," he nearly whispers, swallowing audibly. His eyes are wide, and there's fear in them, swirling in the charcoal black. He's unused to those eyes being easy to read,"I was supposed to make friends with this girl, get her to invite me to her house, and then I had to slit her throat so that her father would find her dead,"

Assassinations have always been common. Child assassinations less so, but the pay is all the greater because of it. His father never shied away from them, because they needed the money, and because it is the mark of a good ninja to do the job no-one else dares-or simply cannot bring themselves-to do.

He remembers those missions well. The ones that left him confused and hollow and angry and tired at the same time. The ones his father preferred to give to him instead of his brother or Tōka, believing perhaps he wasn't as affected by them as they were because he chose not to show it. The other possibility is that his father did know they affected him, but chose to ignore it because regardless of his feelings, Tobiramaalways got the job done. He's not sure which thought upsets him the most.

If the Senju Clan did them, before Hashirama's rule, then there was always the distinct possibility, nay, certainty , that the Uchiha, renowned for their lack of scruples, did them too. The thought must have crossed his mind, at least peripherally. It's only logical, after all.

Although, he doesn't think he ever could have pictured an emotion as raw, as human, as the one he can now see taking a hold on Madara's-young, too young, much too young-face.

"But I couldn't do it. I couldn't. She was so nice, and I just…" he swallows again, thick with unshed tears, and shakes head, raven hair sticking out in every direction, "I've done it before, but this time I just-"

The boy almost chokes on a too-big breath, chest heaving. His eyes are too wide, and he swallows again and again. Bile, Tobirama realizes suddenly, and it's funny, in a very dark way, but he'd never considered any Uchiha capable of having such a knee-jerk reaction to anxiety or fear like nausea. The impassive black eyes are forever ingrained in his waking consciousness, and he's never been able to look past that.

"I-I put her father in a genjutsu," Madara admits softly, miserably, like he's waiting for the executioner's axe. "I made him believe I killed her,"

Tobirama looks at his small form, at the way he's clutching at his stomach, looking away from him like he can't bear looking into anyone's eyes. A child, he marvels. Just a child. Not much different to the boy he once was, or his siblings, squirming and exposed under his father's watchful eye.

A memory comes to him then. An assassination mission he went on with his brother and Tōka, commissioned by one of the Daimyo's most prominent opposers. The daughter was their mission, since it was known the man doted on his child and would crumble upon her death, but they got there too late. All the servants told the same story: they'd found the child dead and given the body proper burial, wept as they cleaned the floors and left flowers on her tomb every day. Yet there was no body in the grave when they dug out the coffin, and no one could say for certain what the cause of death had been. The genjutsu was near flawless, unbreakable without leaving the victims permanently damaged, performed by amaster, and Tōka sang praises to it for months and months thereafter.

They'd tracked the girl down, found her living in the Land of Wind with a distant relation, and Hashirama had taken one look at them and writtenTarget: Deceased on his letter to their father.

Tobirama raged at him as they watched the falcon fly away, "She's our mission!"

"No," Hashirama said, with all of the solemnity of his twelve years of age, "She's just another tool,"

He was right. In the end, the Daimyo committed suicide, and the opposer took over his position, only to be toppled over himself a few years after, by the very men who'd celebrated his ascent. The circle of the world.

"She doesn't deserve to die," Madara says, suddenly defiant and very much like the young man he'll become, the one that will enchant Hashirama to the point of near obsession, "She's Izuna's age,"

Tobirama sighs, searching his mind for something to say, and coming up with the same line his father threw his way when he himself had questioned his orders for the first time, "At times, a shinobi must do things he doesn't deem right,"

Upon hearing those words, Tobirama bowed his head, said Yes, father, and left, internally deeming them the stupidest platitudes ever uttered by an adult to date . He resolved to never voice his doubts again, but to always be the one who made the final call from that moment forward. If he had to live with what he had to do, then he'd be willing to die for what he couldn't live with.

Madara, though. Madara crumbles into a visage of dismay and self doubt.

"You think I was wrong, then?" he asks, anxiety eating away at his voice, "I shouldn't have saved her?"

Tobirama remembers the little girl, Itama's age, playing with a mutt puppy on a pile of sand and laughing. He remembers feeling outrageously jealous of her, for being able to laugh so freely, and live so happy, when so many were dead and so many never even lived in the first place. He remembers being angry for being a child who had to act like an adult, or for being an adult who thought like a child, and because he could not remember ever laughing like that, even in the best moments of his life.

He looks at Madara then, just shy of twelve years old, alone in the countryside and dreading his father's rage, dreading Tobirama's disapproval, because he let another child live .

"You did good," he says, voice thick with things he can't understand, and pretends he doesn't see the way Madara's shoulders slump, like the weight of the world has been lifted off them.

He smiles, but it's a wobbly thing, shaky like a leaf in autumn, and Tobirama wants to tell him to stop. They seat in silence for a while, letting the night roll by on the crackling of the fire.

"Oh, hey," Madara says suddenly, reaching for his bag and rummaging around it until he finds a rectangular wooden box. He presents it to Tobirama triumphantly, "Look what they sold just outside the villa,"

Tobirama peers at the box suspiciously, "What's that?"

The boy rolls his eyes and opens the box with a flourish, revealing the contents to him. Inside the box, ordered in neat rows, there's a dozen tea-cakes shaped like delicate green leaves, each painstakingly moulded and decorated with powdered sugar. Truly admirable work.

"I don't like candy," he says when the box is shoved at him, gently, as if not to jostle the contents.

"But they're your favorites!" Madara cries, shoving the box at him with a bit more force, a stubborn set to his jaw not much different than a mule's, or worse, Hashirama's .

"Alright, alright," Tobirama says exasperatedly, taking the box when it becomes obvious it's either take the box or be brained with it. He scratches his head and gingerly picks out one of the confections. He holds it at eye level and peers at it suspiciously from all angles.

Next to him, Madara crosses his arms over his chest and huffs, "If I wanted to poison you, I would have done it that time I found you half starved by the training grounds,"

Tobirama frowns, "What do you-"

"Just eat it!"

"Alright!" he sighs, "I'll eat this, but I told you: I don't like sweets,"

Madara rolls his eyes so hard Tobirama could swear he heard the optic nerve snap, but then he settles back with no comment, apparently to watch Tobirama eat, little creep that he is.

Tobirama sighs again, wondering how this became his life, and then he takes a bite, chewing experimentally. The texture is off-putting at first, but it's not too sweet, and the green tea flavor is subtle, and refreshing. It's much better than he expected it to be, the creamy centre bursting spicy sweetness on his tongue, and he can't really remember the last time he ate something like this, something that he wasn't eating just because of it's nutritional value, or because he had to eat something and Tōka was shoving it down his throat.

It's...nice.

"Well?" Madara asks once the cake is gone, invading his personal space and gawking at him with a grin wide and delighted and just a tad smug.

Tobirama clears his throat dignifiedly, but when the boy giggles, he knows he's caught.

 _Alright_. Apparently, they _are_ his favorites.

...

 **Thanks for reading!**


	3. cerulean and silver

**Quick things you need to know:**  
 **-For the sake of the plot, here Madara had two older brothers and two younger brothers. Also, Izuna is about seven years younger than him.**  
 **These two you probably know but just in case:**  
 **-Conkers is a game played by two people, each with a conker threaded onto a piece of string: they take turns striking each other's conker until one breaks. (it sometimes gets violent XD)**  
 **-Fivestones is knucklebones or jacks, mainly it consists in tossing up one stone, and picking up one or more from the table while it is in the air.**  
 **:)**

 **Thank you for your lovely reviews.**

* * *

 _Today, I saw God. I know, I know. You probably think I'm high on the thrill of violence and maybe I've swallowed a pint too many of my own blood, but I tell you now-it's the truth._

 _Fighting the Uzumakis is never easy, crafty fuckers that they are, but today we managed to keep them at bay over the southern border. Ryujin was on fire, you should have seen him! He fought little Ashina Uzumaki and lived to tell the tale, and he got piss drunk on mead and painkillers. Sure, his fingers are never coming back, they're sealed inside the Reaper's gut, but that's one hell of a story he's got there now._

 _I have a theory about war. I think that all of us who are out here tell ourselves stories about why we're here, what's the meaning of all this pain. Some go the practical way, and tell themselves that they're here because someone has to be. Some go the spiritual way, and say they're here as destiny's playthings. They tell themselves they're here to defend their land, their family, their parents or their brothers or their children or their fucking dogs, or even that great holy entity: The Clan. We all tell ourselves stories, because it's easier than trying to wrap our heads around the fact that this is just the way the chips fell. There's no greater good, no bigger picture. Maybe we believe it at first or we try to convince ourselves later, but after the first trap seals shut and you're just standing there looking at someone's guts painting the landscape, all thoughts of honour or fairness just fade away. Turns out there's nothing glorious about death, and that's a story we all stopped telling ourselves long ago._

 _So, today I saw God. I cracked open the skull of some poor bastard's little boy, but not before the brat could activate one of those exploding seals they have and stick it on me._

 _It was just a second, the moment between when I saw it and I knew it was going to blow me to pieces, and the moment father ripped off the armour plate and threw it at some other unsuspecting fool. In that moment, I knew: if I die out here, I'll die for nothing._

 _All my life -the things I've learned, the friends I've made, the people I love… All of it for nothing. I've been fighting this war all my life, but I'd never realised that before. God poked me on the forehead and spirited away._

 _We're all realising that, in some way. Slowly but surely, the fights get shorter and our numbers are smaller and smaller with each one. The enemy fairs better, but they're tired too of this lifetime we've had, even if they'll never show such a weakness. We're going through the motions and we all know we are, but I know we won't stop until we've totalled each other into nothing but chunks of meat and ash or the island sinks back to the bottom of the don't know how._

 _There's blood under my fingernails, but I'm too tired to get it all out._

Tobirama marks the place in the journal and closes his eyes. The thrum of water underneath and all around him usually feels like a safety blanket, but the sea tonight is spiteful and rumbling with a storm, hurtling their boat like a toy in her translucent hands. Hashirama is curled in uneasy sleep in his hammock as it rocks violently from side to side, and Torou sits cross legged on the floorboards of their shared cabin, sharpening his blades as if unaware of the turmoil around him.

Above deck, the crew laugh and share jokes as they work, as easy in the storm as the shinobi would be in a fight, Tobirama muses. He runs his finger down the spine of the leather-bound book and reaches for the bottle he and Torou have been passing back and fort for a while. He hasn't been able to move on from this entry in the journal, to the point that he's read and re-read every word so many times he's got it memorized. It's dated about sixty years ago, a year or two before the ultimate decimation of the Namikaze clan from a sizable party to a handful of enslaved children to be used as tokens of goodwill by the Uzumakis. Those last few lines ricochet around Tobirama's skull, brutal and honest as only war can be. Before he even began experimenting with the fabric of space-time, Hisai Namikaze understood the nature of the world well enough to predict his own future accurately: his Clan fought until they could no longer fight, until they were surrounded by pieces of themselves and gasping gurgling breaths, because they knew nothing else.

Hikari-sensei never told him, but his father did, so he knows of the seal that keeps her chakra bound and gagged. He knows that she came to the Land of Fire as his mother's dowry, a woman of nearly thirty years and infinite knowledge: a weapon, to be kept cased and ready to be used, should the need arise. They've never spoken of her place within the Clan, but they all understand it: there's some things not even the Clan Head can change, no matter how loudly Hashirama argues with the elders and the family Heads.

There's peace in Land of Whirlpools simply because there is only one clan left with enough manpower to rule them all. Tobirama wonders if this is truly the only way conflict can come to an end.

Unbidden, and as they do quite often these days, his thoughts turn to Uchiha Madara, the child.

Contrary to popular belief, Tobirama has not always been a grown man. He never had Tōka's brash character, or Hashirama's bubbling energy, and his logical mind never allowed him to court as foolish a wish as his brother's, but as a child Tobirama wished for things. He wished he wouldn't have to do missions that left him cold and empty inside, wished to sleep for a full day and resting his weary bones, wished to skip his grueling lessons, and wished to keep the family he still had left. He never once tried to fool himself into believing he could achieve even one of those wishes.

Madara, though. Madara _dreamed._

He dreamed awake. He dreamed outloud. He dreamed in extravagant rants of glory and utopia, then chided himself for being a fool and laughed. He dreamed in small bursts of frustration, then in cold moments of fury. He dreamed in words, in movement, in action, and he dreamed with a single-minded focus that hurtled him forward and upwards through the chain of command, to his father's side and beyond. He dreamed through death and blood and doubt, then slept and continued dreaming.

Tobirama always thought that a dream of peace was his brother's idea, but he now knows enough to see that Madara's dissatisfaction with the world had come from early childhood, his ideals at least roughly developed by the time he met Hashirama by the river and willingly and knowingly committed treason.

This, too-for a long time Tobirama entertained the idea that perhaps Madara as a child possessed the same kind of aloof disregard for rules Hashirama did, thus not truly realizing the weight of his actions when disclosing secrets to another ninja. But he now knows that was not the case: Madara's position was high enough that he did not have the luxury to even for a second forget the rules. He knew them perfectly, knew them enough to dance around them.

She doesn't deserve to die. She's Izuna's age,he'd said defiantly. The stunt he pulled by not assassinating the Daimyo's daughter, gambling everything on a genjutsu he couldn't know would hold-that alone would have earned him a swift execution, yet Tobirama suspects it wasn't the first time. Nor the the last.

A swig of dry spirits sets his throat ablaze, the boat lurching forward just in time to send his brain spinning. He shakes his head to clear it. Torou raises an inquiring eyebrow, but tobirama merely shakes his head and hands the bottle over, lying back on his hammock. Hashirama moans pitifully.

So, peace was Madara's dream as well. Only it wasn't something as abstract as _peace_ , but something more akin to less _meaningless death._

 _In that moment, I knew: if I die out here, I'll die for nothing._

Hisai's words ring true to him in the sense that he's thought of them dozens of times, and he wonders if all the children of war have twin realizations. He's been fighting for his clan's survival all his life, only perhaps that is simply the story he tells himself: the longer the battle drags itself forward, the less of his clan there is left. The paradox is all-engulfing and everlasting. He sees them die around him everyday, and for what? How many of the people he grew up with are there left? How many will continue to survive? The Uchihas fare no better. Their numbers dwindle, but their will is set ablaze and their determination burns. They'll follow their leader into their death, their commitment to their clan unwavering and true, but they're tired. They're all tired.

Madara's childhood was consumed by his passion, laser-like focus dead set on changing the way things were-a noble dream, and one he'd been willing to die for.

But then why? Why won't Madara take his brother's hand, why won't he sign the peace treaties Hashirama's been offering for so long? It's like every time he manages to shed some light on the mystery that the man is, another piece of the puzzle succumbs into pitch black darkness.

Tobirama remembers a time when he himself believed that if only adults would make a commitment and stand by it, then conflict would end and they would have peace. He'd been a logical child, but a child nonetheless: such an agreement meant trust, and trust-

 _-inscrutable crimson eyes shining from above, tomoe swirling lazily inside. Blood splattering with every step, air carrying a faint metallic tang and the smell of singed hair and cooking meat. A lifetime of torture in a second, a life of suffering in a blink, fields planted with corpses and ashes soaked in blood-_

Trust is not an option.

The trouble with time is that it often makes us forget ourselves, old man Hisai told him, face painted with grief.

Indeed, Tobirama thinks, and resigns himself to another sleepless night.

* * *

There's a dark blue haori and loose pants neatly folded under a rock, which is helpfully labeled "For You" in bright red followed by a childish doodle of a rabbit with enormous front teeth. Tobirama glares at it for a good ten minutes before giving up and picking up the clothes. They're moldy, slightly damp and smell from being exposed to the elements too long, but the pants are a good fit. He stares at the Uchiha crest on the back of the haori, scoffs, and shrugs it on inside out before sitting on the ground to wait.

Madara doesn't show up for about an hour, but Tobirama can feel him meandering the forest without much hurry. The boy's chakra is like a beacon, or a target, spiking up and down as he finds things that interest him or breaks into short pointless bursts of speed, as if racing himself somewhere. He seems to gravitate slowly but surely towards Tobirama, his thoughts obviously all over the place and yet not in his surroundings, because when he finally makes it to the clearing and raises his eyes, he does a double take before his face lights up in surprise.

"You're real! You're real!" Madara squeaks, running towards him excitedly. He trips on a fallen branch on his way and faceplants on the forest floor, sending dead leaves flying. Tobirama winces, but the boy picks himself up like nothing happened. "You're really real!"

He topples to his knees in front of him, beaming expectantly. He's the youngest Tobirama's ever seen him yet.

"I am really real," he confirms. Madara's grin widens more, if that's even possible.

"I knew you were real," he says, nodding enthusiastically, "Hikaku said maybe I imagined you and you were a _halusion-"_

"Hallucination?" Tobirama raises an eyebrow, momentarily ignoring the alarming notion that Uchiha Hikaku might know about him.

"Yes, that's what I said! Well, not what I said. What he said. He said you were a _hallucianon-_ "

 _"Hallucination."_

"-that. But I told him you weren't! I said you were real and you're real! You're really real!" he finishes, sitting back on the fallen leaves with a grin. He cocks his head to the side and makes a face, "You smell funny,"

Tobirama scowls, "It's the clothes, not me. Did you know I was coming?

"You said you were coming back," the boy bristles, raising an accusing finger at Tobirama's face, "But you said you'd come back soon! That was months and months ago, Tobirama!"

"I don't control it," Tobirama shrugs, "I just come and go. How many times have met?"

"We met once," Madara crosses his arms and grumbles under his breath, something about rude time travelers. His hair sticks out in all directions, a leaf perched proudly on a tuft like a flag on top of his head.

Tobirama picks it out and shows it to the boy, "You've been rolling around the bushes?"

Madara flushes bright red and shakes his hair out like a dog, sending leaves and twigs flying everywhere.

"No,"he drawls out, but visibly perks up. Fishing inside his pocket, he proudly presents Tobirama with his treasure: six small, white pebbles, "I'm looking for little rocks. I'm teaching Yohei how to play Fivestones, so I need to find some that fit in his hand,"

"And this required you to dive into a puddle?" Tobirama smirks, pointing at the mud splattered all over the boy's dark clothes. Madara sticks out his tongue, and Tobirama snorts, then asks, "Who's Yohei?"

"He's my little brother," Madara says, "He's a little boring to play with, but Hikaku went off on a mission so now it's just me and Yohei. He can't play outside yet so I tried to teach him how to play conkers but he got mad because he could never hit the chestnut and he started crying really hard, and then I wasn't looking and he ate a bit of the thread, and that was bad. But then he pooped it out, so it was ok,"

"How old are you?"

"I'm seven," says Madara, puffing up his chest with a grin.

"And your brother?"

"Oh, he's two," Yohei is clearly a favorite topic, which means that Izuna isn't yet born. This is disturbing in many different ways, "He can't talk really well yet, so Hikaku says he doesn't count. Do you have any little brothers?"

Tobirama pushes down a surge of emotion with practised ease, "I did,"

"Oh," Madara's face cracks with an understanding of loss far beyond his years, and he scrambles to his feet to throw an arm around Tobirama's neck. "I'm sorry. I don't know what I'd do if I lost Yohei, too," he says.

Izuna isn't yet born then. Tobirama doesn't look at him, lest he see the truth on his face. That his baby brother, the centre of his world, will be dead before he even reaches adolescence.

"D'you wanna play Fivestones with me?"

The change of topics is as abrupt as the boy himself, "I-don't know how to play,"

"That's great! I can practise teaching you!" Madara grins, reaching back into his pocket for his stones as he looks around for an a appropriate patch of dirt to play. Tobirama follows obligingly, listening as the boy babbles, "Hikaku taught me how to play, but he's not a very good teacher so he started stammering and messed up the rules. Then he got mad because I beat him. Our last game was a tie, so we have to have a tie breaker when he gets back-" suddenly he stops, turning around with an uncertain frown on his face, "Hikaku and I are still friends in the future, right?"

Tobirama doesn't answer, wondering if he should. Tōka's words about messing up their lives by interfering with the past swirl into his thoughts, making him pause. Would it truly make a difference to disclose such unimportant information? Would it change Madara's behaviour? Could he sway the boy's actions by doing it? How different would the future be, if Uchiha Hikaku weren't Madara's second lieutenant?

Madara clearly takes his silence to be a negative. "Oh, no. We're not, are we?" His face crumples and his eyes well with tears, his lower lip wobbling as he clutches his stones to his chest. Tobirama stares in horror.

"No," he says, but it's the wrong thing to say. Tears spill down the boy's cheeks and, "No, no! I didn't mean that! Oh, no, please don't cry,"

But Madara doesn't hear him, "I don't want to play anymore!" he wails, throwing his stones away. Being a genius level shinobi, and specialized in the use of ninja tools like all the Uchiha, the stones leave his hand as deadly weapons. One of them catches Tobirama in the shin.

"Fuck," he hisses, faintly panicking because crying children are not something he thinks he's equipped to handle. He falls to his knees, hand hovering over the boy's shoulder for a few seconds before awkwardly settling down, "Look, I promise you are still friends"

Puffy coal eyes regard him guardedly, "You're not lying?"

"I wouldn't lie to you," Tobirama lies. Madara sniffles, wiping at his face, but he doesn't step away from the hand on his shoulder, seemingly drawing comfort from it.

"I lost my stones," he says forlornly.

"You threw your stones," _at me_ , he doesn't say, because Madara still looks the picture of misery despite the reassurances.

They look for the stones in silence, Tobirama making a show of searching while simply picking up any small stone he finds. When he presents them to Madara, the boy frowns, picking one up, "Is this my stone?"

"It is. I'd recognize it anywhere,"

Madara nods, satisfied. There's tracks of tears and mud on his face, and his hair looks like a bird's nest. The child is an absolute mess, playing alone in the forest with a time-traveling stranger. Tobirama is starting to see where the strange child he's met so many times came from.

"You can never tell anyone about me," he blurts out suddenly.

Madara looks up from where he's seated on the ground again, "Why not?"

"Because," he deadpans, "It's the rules,"

"There's rules to time travel?" Madara frowns, sounding more skeptical than any seven year old has any business sounding, but then his eyes widen and his mouth form an "o" of surprise. "Is that why you can't have clothes?"

"...Yes," Tobirama says, sensing that this is a necessary concession, "That's why,"

Madara nods like this is the most logical thing in the world.

They play Fivestones for an hour, although it's mainly Madara explaining the rules and Tobirama pretending not to understand just to annoy him. The boy is very close to either chucking a stone at his head or turning into a rage tomato, but then Tobirama returns to the present. Only instead of landing in his cabin, he lands next to the boat. _In_ the water.

He's beginning to loathe all kinds of travel.

* * *

Upon their return, Tōka takes one look at them, says, "Finally," dumps a handful of scrolls on Tobirama's arms and goes hunting. She isn't seen for a week.

"We were this close to a massacre," Hikari-sensei comments cheerfully as she pours them mint tea, holding her thumb and index finger at a distance that implies they'd been very close indeed.

"There's still food in the vaults, and nothing's on fire," Tobirama points out, frowning at some papers and not understanding anything he reads, "Sure, the forest animals shall suffer her wrath, but at least when she gets back we'll have smoked venison. That's always a plus,"

"Oh, _gods,_ " Hashirama says, sounding disgusted. The bits of his face visible through his fingers are tinged green with nausea, "Don't say that,"

"What," he raises an eyebrow, giving up on trying to read _"Smoked venison?"_

"Didn't you have enough of me throwing up all over you this week?"

"No vomit on my floors, please. I cleaned this morning," Hikari chides, sliding mint tea in front of Tobirama and a foul smelling concoction in front of his brother. Medicine, no doubt. Hashirama chokes and gags.

"This is our house, Hikari sensei," Tobirama reminds her, "And you never clean,"

"I can't deny that, boy, but still. I'm a sympathetic vomiter, so unless you want to see a chain reaction that'll scar you for life, no throwing up on my floors, please,"

"I don't think I can even do it anymore," Hashirama says, staring morosely at his cup. "I haven't eaten anything solid since Land of Whirlpools,"

"Ah, yes. The sea will do that to you, love," Hikari pats him on the shoulder, urging him to drink, "But it's a fine bonding exercise. I didn't know your mother when we got on the boat that brought us here, but by the time we reached land we were best friends,"

" _Anija_ and I are closer than ever," Tobirama mutters, sipping his tea and mentally barring the memories away from his conscious mind.

"If you survived that, your bond is unbreakable," she nods, patting him sympathetically on the shoulder, "Speaking of brotherly love, how fairs the old man? Still a hermit?"

"He sends you all his love and preserved peppers," Hashirama says, rubbing his temples. His eyes are sunken from the dehydration, but at least the deathly pallor he'd sported earlier is gone. "And a set of skinning knives,"

"Did he embarrass you unnecessarily?"

Tobirama averts his eyes, "...yes,"

"He choked on air," Hashirama chirps, never one to miss an opportunity to twist the knife.

"That's my brother," Hikari whoops, smiling contentedly. "And was he helpful?"

"I don't know yet," Tobirama says, thinking back on the journals. There's some promising content, investigation notes and snippets of theory copied verbatim from tomes he thought lost to time, all amongst war letters and journal entries, but still… "Too soon to tell,"

Hashirama's face twists into a worried visage, but Hikari shrugs.

"Better than nothing," she says, closing the topic. It doesn't sound like a platitude when she says it, but more like a logical statement: that's all you got, but worrying unnecessarily is as useless as trying to hold air within your hands. _Don't fret, boy. You're already grey, on top of that you'll go bald, and I'll have to euthanize you to spare the world your ugly mug._

"Yes," Tobirama chuckles, "You're right,"

He feels someone approaching, then. There's Torou's tightly controlled, steel cold and sharp chakra, at ease and yet ready to strike at all times, and a rattled, nervous one at his side. Somewhere out on the street, approaching the house, opening the door and bustling inside, a bundle of fretting energy lined with an edge of-

"Why is Ichirou-san afraid of coming into our house?" he asks, puzzled. The man was easily rattled and high strung by nature, but always with an undercurrent of iron befitting a man of his stature.

"Oh, that," Hikari cackles, "Tōka threw her shoe at him when he corrected her grammar,"

Hashirama frowns, "That's not so bad,"

"She set it on fire first,"

Tobirama is about to roll his eyes at the obvious fabrication, but then the man in question rushes to greet them, sporting a conspicuous lack of eyebrows. Hikari snickers like a schoolgirl, and Torou smirks almost imperceptibly as he takes his usual spot standing guard by the door.

"It's good to have you back," Hashirama's secretary tells them both, a look of genuine relief washing over his face, "I trust you had a pleasant trip,"

"It sucked,"Hashirama booms, his eyes blank, but he's smiling. The secretary's eye twitches with violence.

Hikari claps her hands together loudly.

"Well, your brain-to-mouth filter is shot. Time for a strategic retreat," she says, grabbing Hashirama by the arm and hauling him towards his study.

"But I'm alright!"

She scoffs, "For a _corpse_ ,"

"Sleep would do you well, anija. I'll deal with any pressing matters," Tobirama agrees, crossing his arms.

"I'm just a little dehydrated," Hashirama grumbles, wobbling dangerously as he walks, "Some water and I'll be ok,"

Tobirama raises an eyebrow, "Then you can do all the paperwork-"

"-I feel dreadful, really. Why, I'm about to keel over. Feel my temperature, Hikari-sensei,"

"Boy," Hikari says to him suspiciously, "you'd tell me if you were going to throw up on me, right?"

Hashirama gives her a wan smile. "You shoulda thought of that before you made me drink that crap."

They go down the hallway and their voices fade. Tobirama sighs.

"Any new developments?" he asks, massaging his temples, "How are the crops coming along? And the situation with the Nara clan?"

"It's all-all going well," Ichirou-san stammers in his characteristic mumble, "However, there's something-"

"The Naras didn't show at the meeting point again?" he growls, narrowing his eyes. Lazy fuckers always pulled the same stunt.

"N-no. The young man they appointed was on time, and though he complained copiously about the early hour the negotiations went as expected,"

"Then what is it?"

"Well-it is hard to explain,"

"What is it," usually, Tobirama has limited patience for the man's particular temperament, but the trip took it's toll on him and he's not feeling precisely tolerant.

The man gulps at the glare he receives, but looks away and starts to speak, "The surveillance parties sent out to scout the Uchiha compound-"

Tobirama sits up straight, blinking away sleep and tiredness. By the door, he feels Torou tense,"They've been captured? Maimed? Killed?"

They didn't send parties large enough to engage, at Hashirama's request, and Tobirama is cursing himself right now. The men sent were prepared for a scouting mission, if they were attacked-

"N-no, sir,"

Tobirama breathes a sigh of relief. Torou's energy uncoils a little bit.

"What then?"

"Have they done that thing again where they made everyone dance until they fainted?" Torou pipes in.

There's a collective shudder at the memory.

"No, sir. Thank the gods, not that." Ichirou says, scratching his head in bewilderment, "They brought something, though. I-well, I think you should see it," the man reaches into his bag and pulls out a square wooden box, plain and dark but for the confectioner's logo on top of the lid. He slides it to Tobirama on the table with a shrug, "We've scanned for poisons, genjutsu, hidden seals, traps...Nothing."

Tobirama knows. He's not listening anymore. He opens the box to find, lined in neat rows, a dozen green-tea cakes shaped like leaves and sprinkled with sugar. There's nothing written, nothing that can be seen, and yet the message feels like a punch in the gut nonetheless.

Tobirama's glaring at the pastries, but is actually glaring at life in general, when he travels and lands face down on a patch of soft grass. He growls darkly, hating everything.

He's surprised to find that he's once again smack in the middle of the Uchiha compound, but there's no one for miles around. The lines of high and mighty oaks he saw the few times he was here are gone, sad stumps left in their place like maimed limbs protruding from the dry earth. The koi pond at the centre of the compound is empty and dry, the bones of bamboo water fountains left pouring air into nothing.

There's a few neat rows of houses, all abandoned without sign of resistance and ransacked by opportunists, the windows smashed and doors forced open. There's no sign of fighting, no blood on the floors, no burns on the walls, no discarded weapons, no remnants of chakra, no molten rock and splinters. In one of the houses, a bed is still made, a stuffed bear made of rags left neglected on top of the covers. It's like the child simply did not return one day. Tobirama curls into a corner, naked and shivering, and tries not to think about how Madara may be dead, how Hashirama might be dead, how Tōka might be dead, how he might be dead. The day fades into night, the hours crawl by him. Time slips away, and he's reminded of how everyone fades from his life like boats receding into the horizon, how no one is permanent, not even himself.

The whole place is empty of anything, and for a sensor like him it's like a black hole, swallowing universes whole. He returns to the present to find not a second has gone tea-cakes lined in the box seem mock him with the bright memory of a wild child.

 _Your favorites._

Tobirama feels unbearably old.

….

Someone hovers over his bed.

"Awaken, Senju," a voice like the rumble of thunder speaks, "I have a need of you,"

Tobirama startles awake and into a nightmare, for the ghost of Uchiha Madara is standing next to his bed.

He's with his back against the wall and falling into a fighting stance even before his mind can finish processing the fact that even though he can see Madara, he can't feel him. He would think he's dreaming, if it weren't for the fact that he can feel his brother sleeping in the room down the hall, a nightmare making him toss and turn, and he can sense Tōka in the kitchen, sleepless and numb, nursing a glass of spirits. Across the street, the sentry's head bobs once and he startles awake, shifting his weight from one foot to the other to keep his mind busy and awake until his shift finally ends.

Madara looks at him scan his surroundings, and doesn't say a word. Somehow, he's hiding himself from Tobirama's senses. Without his massive chakra about himself, he's as insubstantial to Tobirama as a spirit or a fae, his intentions as murky as the sea after a storm. He knows he's caught, that he's been caught since he opened his eyes and fixed them directly into Madara's Sharingan: a fool's mistake, and one that's costed him everything.

"Are you here to kill me?"

To his credit, his voice is calm despite the fact that his heart is hammering against his ribcage. All he can see of Madara beyond his dark silhouette are his eyes, which are very red and very amused. It's the same look a cat might give a mouse in it's paws; dinner and a game, all in one.

"Not today." he says simply, like he's bestowing a gift.

Tobirama's eyes narrow. "A social visit, then? I believe you've got the wrong room,"

"Being deliberately obtuse does not suit you," says Madara chidingly,"You got my message. I reckon you know exactly why I'm here"

Tobirama lights the lamp on the bedside table, bathing the room in a soft golden hue. Was the lamp there before he woke up, or is this all part of a genjutsu? He doesn't know. His memory is hazy, although whether that's because he just woke up or he's caught in a genjutsu, he has no way to tell. He can feel Madara's Sharingan follow his movements, tomoe swirling lazily inside like something out of a crazed delusion, until he dares meet those eyes again.

The moment is surreal. The golden light does Madara no favour, his face a study of stark light and shadows, darkness pooling around his sunken eyes and there where his hair falls over his forehead. His face is impassive and his posture is relaxed. It takes Tobirama a moment to realize that what's strange about his appearance, other than the fact that he's in Tobirama's bedroom, is that he's not wearing his armour. Without the outer layer of bulky red metal and clad in a simple black tunic and pants, the man looks leaner, almost-small. Definitely not any less imposing, but slighter, and all the more dangerous for it. Tobirama is struck by how off-putting it is to see that mass of unruly black hair devoid of at least one twig or leaf caught somewhere.

Madara's expression is patient. He's been waiting for this conversation, Tobirama realizes. Been waiting for a long time. But why?By all means, if Madara ever meant to approach him about this, he could have done it any time in the past decade, but he never did. He waited until now. Did he realise that Tobirama's been traveling backwards because of his age? Was he aware of the date?

In a moment of clarity, the memory hits him.

"You clutched your chest," he says, realization coloring his words, "The first time I traveled, you clutched your chest,"

"It burned," is the response he receives, clipped and short. "Afterwards, Izuna told me you used a new jutsu. It was easy to put two and two together,"

It suddenly crashes around Tobirama's head that this man and the child he lost at conkers with just this morning are the same person. Up to this point, it's been easy to put out of his mind the fact that he's been actually traveling through time, but now the thought is impossible to avoid.

For some reason, Tobirama feels violated, like something else's been taken from him. It's not just that he's being yanked back and forth through someone else's life, it's not just that he's been forced to face the death of his family over and over during the past few months, it's also that Madara's know him since he was a little boy. That fateful day on the river, Madara had known him for at least five years prior. Somehow, illogical as it is, he feels betrayed by his own enemy.

Here's a man who knows more about his life and future than he himself does. The thought is jarring, and it sets his blood ablaze.

"You've known me since you were seven years old," he says, packed with accusation. There's still a part of him that harbours hope that the other will deny everything and laugh. That way, this will all just have been a bad dream or a cruel genjutsu.

But Madara doesn't deny it.

"Six," he corrects, then quiets again.

"How…?" Tobirama starts, but trails off, not knowing how to finish. How did this happen? How do I make it stop?

He settles for, "Why?"

Madara huffs, somehow rolling his eyes with his whole body. The gesture is so familiar by now that Tobirama has to resist the urge to chuck a shoe at him.

"I don't know why. You tell me how," is the answer he gets, an edge of frustration to the words, "All I know is that a time traveling naked Senju's been stalking me half my life,"

Half his life?Tobirama feels the blood drain from his face, "How many times?"

"Dozens,"

"Does it ever stop?"

Madara shrugs again.

"You usually looked like this," he says, not looking at him, "But then again, your family ages well,"

The omission is easy to grasp in that Madara said _usually_ , not _always_. Tobirama shuts his eyes and breathes in slowly through his nose, reigning in his temper. He has to open his eyes fast though, because he can't feel Madara there, right where he can see him, and it's tattering his nerves. He feels like he's hallucinating, or facing a ghost. There's a void where Madara's monstrous chakra should be, and that is not right. It reminds him too much of the empty Uchiha compound, and oaks chopped near the root.

"What for?" he asks, nails digging into his palms. Gods, his stomach hurts.

Madara blinks very slowly. Tobirama sees a flash of a red-nosed boy in the snow, and grits his teeth.

"What do you mean?"

"What was the point?"Tobirama growls.

Madara scowls, arms crossing over his chest, "You tell me,"

 _"I don't know!_ " he's aware he's pacing and quite probably shouting, but he also knows that trapped inside Madara's genjutsu nobody can hear him so he doesn't care, "Why would I come back to you? Why always you? What's the fucking point?"

He's been faced with the gut-wrenching choice to murder his enemy during the man's infancy, thus sparing himself and others countless losses; he's been forced to accept the fate of his deceased loved ones over and over again; he's been shown a painfully impossible future, and an excruciatingly unbearable past; he's been brought to his knees by an empty room and the certainty that life is fickle.

 _I have a theory about war, Hisai wrote. I think that all of us who are out here tell ourselves stories about why we're here, what's the meaning of all this pain._

He needs a story to tell himself, but he's never been good enough at dreaming to concoct a tale that will make his chest stop burning at the helplessness he feels, at the injustice of it all.

"It's only with your heart that you can see rightly," says Madara, eyes faraway.

"You already told me that," snaps Tobirama. "What does it mean?"

Madara's eyes narrow to slits, "You told me that. Made me repeat it three times, made sure I'd remember it. You said that there were things you had to figure out by yourself,"

Tobirama huffs out a helpless laugh and lets his arms fall limply to his sides, "That's not helpful,"

"It's not my job to help you, Senju," Madara snaps at him, vitriol lacing each word. Whereas his original approach had been open and borderline friendly, which is a notion Tobirama won't touch for now, he's currently as distant as Tobirama's ever seen him. Arms crossed over his chest and scowl firmly in place, he's the enemy Tobirama's used to see, with shadow and light dancing across his face in a play of smoke on mirrors.

" _Tobirama_ ," he hears himself say, caught in the play of emotions that drag themselves across the Uchiha's face even underneath the cold veneer.

Madara frowns, momentarily thrown, "What?"

"You-" he swallows, then lets the words out, "You call me Tobirama,"

Always, since the very beginning.

Madara blinks, then looks at him consideringly. His bangs cast a shadow across his face that looks like a scar, splitting his face in two: known and unknown, past and present. He raises his hand slowly, hypnotically, and as if by art of magic a wickedly sharp blade appears between his deft fingers.

It's in this moment that Tobirama realizes Madara's eyes are black, not red, and this is no genjutsu, but the real world.

He's standing against the wall of his room, breathing hard and absolutely disoriented. He blinks unfocused eyes to keep Madara in his field of vision, he feels himself losing consciousness. His chakra control is shot and his body is trembling, weakened beyond belief, and it's a struggle just to stay upright. Damn that cursed Sharingan.

He gathers just enough control to send out a chakra wave so powerful it must wake the neighbours, but he doesn't care: all he cares is that, down the hallway, Hashirama startles awake.

Madara scoffs disdainfully, eyes alight with misgivings.

"Hn. Not _you_ ," he says, and lets fly. Tobirama's eyes widen, but he can't cannot move.

The blade buries itself deep into the wall less than half an inch from his temple. A few strands of silvery white hair flutter to the floor. His heart pounds with fright. .

Madara smiles thinly, "Don't look so upset. You know I never miss my mark,"

Iridescent black flames line his silhouette for an instant, like an inferno opening to swallow him whole, and then burn his frame away. Hashirama slams the door open just in time to see the last of the shadow fire consume itself into thin air.

"What happened?" he asks, watching Tobirama slide to the floor and away from the blade.

He rubs at the side of his head with trembling fingers, and a small clump of hair comes away just as Tōka comes running into the room, looking frazzled and ready to fight despite being in her nightclothes. He knows that her keen eyes can capture everything, from the sweat that's making his clothes cling to his body to the glittering remains of foreign fire chakra in the air, and he can feel the second her eyes fall on the blade embedded on the wall.

He swallows twice, then tries to speak, "I-"

"- _Tobirama_ ,"she says, alarm gripping at her tone.

Hashirama grips the blade and pulls it from the wall, his large hand engulfing the hilt. It's a small curved thing, an ornate piece of metal polished to a high shine and sharper than wind, and when his brother dangles it questioningly in front of his face his heart nearly stutters to a stop.

Engraved into Madara's blade is the curiously unique symbol of Hiraishin, and curling into the entrails of the metal like vines of fading cerulean and silver are old tendrils of Tobirama's chakra, curled together with Madara's own in a tight, intricate pattern.

Fire and water bound together, like two destinies intertwined.


	4. Faith

**Sorry for the delay! Thank you for the lovely feedback. I hope you like this one :)**

* * *

Despite being relatively close to one another, there's a stark difference between the forests that bloom across Senju lands, and the wildwoods that tower the land inhabited by the Uchiha.

Oriented towards nature from their very roots, the Senju nurtured their land, treasuring it as a valuable source of nourishment and refuge. Generations of Mokuton users left behind canopies of golden, heart-shaped leaves and tall oaks for building houses, stocky apple trees and fragrant citruses, and clusters of walnuts. Leafy medicinal plants crawl the soil and shield the roots from the cold, and not even in the winter do the majestic canopies seem to lose their inherent, boastful life.

In contrast, the forests where Madara played as a child are sparse in foliage, even at the height of spring, dark shades of green and burnt out wood thrumming with an undercurrent wildness. Tall pines and dense eucalyptus harvested for essential oils, thorny bushes and painfully sharp pine needles littering the bare earth. Cold and unforgiving land, wild and lonely. Nothing like the warm breeze that carries sweet wisteria and willowherb to him and makes him think of his mother's kind smile.

And yet, as Tobirama gazes out at the cheerful trees of his childhood, he can't help but wish for the peaceful quiet of uninhabited land, can't help but scan the air for the telling whiff of scorched wood amongst evergreen pines. It's a sudden, unexpected yearning, and it brings to his mind the memory of Uchiha Madara's toothless grin. This in turn reminds him of Madara's black eyes the night he appeared to Tobirama like a spiteful ghost, which makes him grimace.

He vividly remembers the feeling of displaced air as the dagger flew at him, can practically feel the second cold metal touched the skin of his temple as the blade embedded itself inches from his flesh. He can still see the few stray silver hairs whispering their way to the floor-

 _Don't look so upset. You know I never miss my mark._

With a huff, Tobirama throws a stone at a tree with enough force to make leaves fall and birds flee it in a startled flock.

The close encounter with Madara left him rattled, and with more questions than answers floating around in his head, banging at the insides of his skull. He can't for the life of him figure out the meaning of the man's words, or figure out how he'd manage to shield himself from Tobirama's perception at such close range. He would be tempted to consider it all nothing but a profoundly disconcerting nightmare, if it weren't for the fact that the spectre had left behind a token of his visit.

The dagger is a mystery he can't even begin to wrap his head around, a piece of metal hiding within itself a core of chakra powerful enough to bend the structures of space and time. Not only is it's existence baffling, but it's creation something he can't imagine. The amount of power and skill required to create such a piece, such a weapon-

Using his chakra.

There is no doubt about it, that coiled into the entrails of the metal is Tobirama's lifeforce linked with Madara's. Not only is the concept impossible, but also bordering on the absurd. And yet-

 _"It's not my job to help you, Senju,"_ Madara had said, genuine spite weaving through his practised indifference. Never had his own clan name felt so wrong to Tobirama's ears as it did in that moment, vexing as that admission is. It was almost as if something in him rebelled against the idea of Madara addressing with such obvious scorn, such little familiarity, such little...affection.

Disgusted at his own train of thought, Tobirama groans loudly and massages his temples. He can feel a headache coming.

It is true that, in contrast to young Madara's obvious delight upon seeing him, present Madara's derision became even more obvious. It is also undeniable that, when faced with this, Tobirama had felt off-balance. Shocked, like a bucket of freezing water had woken him up from peaceful sleep. Suddenly he cannot hide away from the fact that, in his mind, Uchiha Madara's place has gone from hated enemy to-to-

For the thousandth time in the past few months, he curses every single choice that landed him in the current moment. Then, for good measure, he curses Madara, but there's almost no spite in it, which only makes him angrier.

"I could feel you brooding all the way from my house," Hikari-sensei says somewhere behind him, her cracking voice carried by the wind.

"I was unaware of your sensor skills," Tobirama deadpans, but it doesn't carry any bite.

She chuckles,"It only works on a handful of subjects, I'll admit. Sullen child,"

She comes to stop by his side and sits down on the log. The surface of it is too low, and her movements are slow and jerky, but he's aware that if he were to even think of mentioning anything resembling an offer of help she would smack him over the head.

Instead, he gazes out at the wilderness, and tries not to think of how painfully old his master has become. Time, it would seem, has become the centre of all his problems these days. He feels he's fighting it, in a lot of ways, or at the very least going against it, and it repays him his mutiny by reminding him, in moments like this one, that its slipping away from him like smoke through his fingers.

On his last travel, he spent two hours watching Madara play with his brother by the river, and came back to find three days had gone by. How long, he wonders, until he gets yanked back to the present to find his whole life has gone by? That his family is dead? That his clan is destroyed?

What story will he tell himself then?

Hikari-sensei doesn't press him, doesn't say a word, and the silence seems to be more about company than anything else. She worries, he knows. They all worry.

"I came to return this," she says after they've stared out into nothing for a while, pulling out the dagger from her pouch, the sharp gleaming metal wrapped in a length of cloth.

He felt it on her as soon as he felt her chakra approach him, but the sight of it still makes him flinch. He forces himself to grab it, the sizzling energy of it seeming to nip at his fingers even through the cloth. It feels a little bit like fire, wanting to dance over the surface of his skin. Impulsively, he peels back the wrapping, wanting to catch sight of the object that's been plaguing his thoughts non-stop for two weeks now.

It is a slim shard of metal, slightly curved and polished to a high shine, the wicked sharpness of it seemingly almost an afterthought. It's masterful work, either by a forger or a seal master, but he's not sure which. He's already concluded that it is indeed the dagger which holds the power to make him jump through time, but he hasn't figured out how. For all that Madara was the one to give it him, his younger version claimed not to have the slightest clue about it's existence when Tobirama asked him in his latest travel. For some reason, he doesn't think the child would lie. Not to him, anyway. The instinctive certainty he feels is vexing.

When he looks up, he finds Hikari-sensei regarding him evenly.

"Chakra like this can only be given away freely," she says meaningfully, tapping a finger to the dagger. It reacts to her too, only instead of a gentle ripple the energy lashes out like a whip, "It's a seal of protection, a lifekeeper. Exact same measures of opposing forces wound together into a single element-rather impressive, actually. I'd never seen it done before,"

"But you've heard of it?"

She looks to the West. It is simply because he knows where to look that he can see her ancient gaze stretching over the hills, beyond the plains and across the deep blue sea, where he knows Land of Whirlpools rests like a gem on the surface of the water. She looks to her home, where she may never return.

"Fuuinjutsu master Uzumaki Akane somehow healed her husband with it during the Battle for Hitobi Mountain, when he was struck down by one of our poisoned arrows. The general rose like he'd never even fallen in the first place," she blinks, turns her owlish eyes to Tobirama, and the morose pathos around her falls off like snow in June, "Don't ask me how. I studied her notes, when I became Uzumaki-sama's library keeper, but I could never make true sense of them. As far as I knew, that was the only time it was ever used and she died shortly after, though I cannot tell you what the cause was,"

Tobirama runs a finger down the side of the blade, entranced at the way energy blooms under his fingertips. Lifekeeper.

"Would the strain of the seal weaken her?"

"Possibly. Chakra depletion is always a bitch," Hikari shrugs, "Then again, it was war. Records weren't kept very well, so most probably she met her end like countless others before and after her: at the pointy end of some lucky kunai,"

The hiraishin mark carved into the metal startles when he presses his fingers to it, causing a reaction somewhere on Tobirama's chest. A pull, a calling. The reason why this whole mess started, right here: the symbol that so effortlessly came to him that day in his study, the same one that so effortlessly has managed to make him go to it so many times. More than a jutsu or a seal, it feels like the ancient children stories his mother used to tell him and his brothers, where arcane magic bound together those whose fates were meant to touch.

"Curse the day you started teaching me about seals," Tobirama mutters, but even as he rages inside at this situation, a part of him remains utterly fascinated. Hikari-sensei pinches his shoulder, hard.

"Do not blame your foolishness on me, boy. I've told you all your life that curious head of yours would get you in trouble if you did not keep it in check,"

He sighs, wrapping the blade back up. It hums, almost as if...disappointed. Interesting.

"Yet here we are,"

"Here we are," she echoes. The breeze picks up. Gray hair once yellow and bright plays with the wind in the space between them, "Now will you tell me why you're sulking?"

It is on the tip of his tongue to snap that he is not sulking. Then he remembers he's been sitting on a log since daybreak, wishing for the forest to be another, pondering questions and trying to figure out the answers, and succeeding in nothing. He did scare the hell out of some birds, though.

Mostly, he came out here to be alone. The truth is that the compound feels oppressive, the usual comfort of having his people closeby where he can feel them -alive, alive, alive- becoming overbearing to his senses. After the night of Madara's sudden appearance in his room, and following his absolute refusal to fill his brother and cousin in on the true nature of his jumps through times, his house became unbearably harrowing to live in. Touka became distant, her hurt anger seething at him from the next room whenever she isn't avoiding him by spending hours at the training grounds or at the forge, but however much her distance pains him, he much prefers it to Hashirama's worry lapping at the edges of his awareness, flooding him with guilt for making his brother so absolutely miserable and scared.

He can't tell them about Madara. He just can't. He fears what they'll say, what they'll want him to do, what they'll think of him. This whole thing has become too real, now that present Madara has acknowledged that it's all true. He can barely allow himself to think about it, let alone try to explain it. All he knows is that, somehow, they're intertwined in an arcane way that boggles the mind, that goes beyond simple coincidence.

The stress of the situation, coupled with the constant fear that he'll be yanked through time at any moment, is making him anxious in ways he hasn't been since childhood, back when he still hadn't had complete control over his power and being in a room with more than five people in it overwhelmed him to the point of tears. Only now he no longer has his mother to calm him down, and the strain he's under is beginning to cause him physical pain.

"I do not know how to speak to them," he finally admits, swallowing convulsively. "I don't know where to start,"

It is an understatement. Hikari hums in thought, "I might seem awfully unoriginal, but starting at the beginning tends to be the logical course of action. Practical, too,"

Tobirama huffs a laugh, shaking his head. What beginning? The first time he met Madara, that day on the river when he was ten years old and sent to spy on his own brother, or the first time Madara met him? Which, for him, hasn't even happened yet.

He can barely understand it himself.

Hikari lays a hand on his shoulder, the worried warmth of it not enough to calm his tattered nerves, "What frightens you, boy?"

 _That other people seem to know more about my life than me. That when the moment comes, I won't know what I'm supposed to do._

He remembers the feeling of being alone in the world, that day spent at the emptied Uchiha compound years into the future, and the thought of returning to that is almost enough to send him into panic. In his pocket, the dagger pulses like a promise, or a threat. All around them, the forest is alive with the joyous chirping of birds and rustling leaves.

With a sigh, Hikari-sensei pulls away her hand. Tobirama feels even more bereft than he did before.

* * *

Tobirama lands in Land of Rice Fields, a mile from the southern border. He's on edge the second his skin touches the soil, the alarms in his head going of screaming foreign foreign foreign. His skin prickles, cold sweat gathers at the back of his neck, and he ducks for the cover of darkness almost instinctively. He touches three fingers to ground and lets his senses carry him outwards, searching for friend or foe. He finds nothing. The silence is worse than being surrounded by enemies.

Land of Rice Fields is not home to many shinobi, but the few clans that inhabit it are powerful, and very territorial. Tobirama searches for the chakra signature he's become familiar with, a touch of annoyance dripping into his mood. What the hell is Madara doing in enemy territory?

His monstrous chakra, that rippling, bubbling energy that's nearly too much for his senses sometimes, is nowhere to be found, almost as if it's been swallowed up by the earth itself. Tobirama wants to slit his own throat when he recognizes something like concern threading through him, but can't help himself. For all he knows, Madara is a child right now.

He can't feel him anywhere. He knows, logically, that the kid has to be out here. He has to be out here, because otherwise Tobirama would not be here. He can feel the pull of the mark, now that he knows where to look for it, somewhere in his chest: a technique that feels nearly like magic calling for him. It's fascinating.

If the mark's power is enough to summon him through time, it should also be enough to carry him a distance, he muses, looking up at the sky. Tobirama wants to claw his own eyes out, because he's curious. Gritting his teeth, he calls up his chakra to him, water and lightning crackling at his fingers. He concentrates on the pull right under his ribs, on the tingling on his limbs, on the mark in Madara's dagger.

"Gods be fucked," he mutters, already regretting it, and then he fades away. Madara squawks like a chicken when Tobirama lands on top him.

For a moment, there is stunned, absolute silence. Madara-at least sixteen, older than Tobirama's ever seen him in his travels- stares up at him, coal eyes comically wide, wild hair splayed around his head like spilled ink against the floorboards. Color spreads from his nose outwards, faint but fast like a wildfire, and Tobirama is struck by the fact that he's watching Uchiha Madara blush.

Then the door slides open, and Tobirama remembers he's kneeling on top of a teenager. And he's naked.

"Nii-san, do you think we can-OH MY GOD MY EYES!" Izuna screeches, then covers his face with both hands and turns around.

Tobirama teleports himself away as far as he can, cornering himself behind a desk so that only his head is visible, a wall at his back and a clear view of the room. Madara turns a spectacular shade of crimson, and scrambles to his feet. For a few moments, no one speaks.

"I feel _violated,"_ Izuna says morosely through his fingers, still looking resolutely away, "I feel ill, and violated, and I hate you both," then, almost as an afterthought, "But mainly you, Senju dog,"

Tobirama is too stunned to feel affronted. Madara rolls his eyes, but his face is still dangerously red.

"Nothing happened, Izuna," he grumbles, grabbing a pack that's lying on the floor next to a pair of rolled up futons, and rifling through the contents. "Tobirama appeared...on me. That's all. You know he can't control it,"

"How _convenient,_ " Izuna huffs. The amount of sheer contempt in his voice makes Tobirama wonder how it can all fit in his small body, but he turns around to gaze solemnly at his brother, "You'll have to take my eyes now, _nii-san_. This, I cannot unsee,"

Madara chucks a shoe at his face. Izuna squawks

"Don't be so dramatic. You've seen him naked before,"

Tobirama blanches behind his desk, _"He's seen me naked before?"_

Madara gives him a sheepish grin, "Half the Clan's seen you naked by now,"

"Plus some unfortunate nin from Land of Water last summer," Izuna pipes in cheerfully, "It was traumatizing for everyone involved, but they died and we didn't, so it was a fortunate misfortune,"

Madara hands him some clothes, his black eyes carefully averted, faint blush still clinging to his skin. Tobirama rises from his hiding spot, carefully shielding himself from sight, and takes them.

"Why are you so stripey?" Izuna asks in all seriousness, head cocked to the side.

Tobirama splutters, "I am _not_ ,"

"You are, though," Madara says, pointedly staring at the reddened scars-akin to those on his cheeks and chin- that curl around his biceps, and slash over his chest and abdomen, "They do look a little bit like-"

"They are not stripes," Tobirama hisses, spitefully turning the haori inside out to hide the Uchiha crest before throwing it on, "They are the markings of the Iron Wolves, and I got them once my training with them was concluded,"

Madara looks suitably impressed, but Izuna scrunches up his nose and closes one eye, "Does that mean you are a Senju wolf instead of a Senju dog? Is that better or worse?"

Tobirama breathes in very slowly, trying to keep his frayed temper in check. His chakra lashes out before he can hold it back, and chips of wood fly from the surface of the desk.

The child is oblivious, "Since when do wolves have stripes anyway?"

"Quit pestering him, brat," Madara snaps, swiftly stepping in and effectively keeping Tobirama from committing infanticide, "I caught some fish upstream. Go make dinner,"

Izuna groans, "You always make me cook,"

"Would you rather eat _my_ cooking again?"

The boy blanches, face constricting with revulsion at the memory of what must have been a culinary fiasco, and obediently scurries off, sliding the door shut behind himself.

Madara huffs a laugh, "I always thought they were stripes,"

Tobirama, now clothed, crosses his arms over his chest and shoots him an unfriendly look.

"Why are you in Land of Rice Fields?" he demands, eyes roaming his surroundings. A sober, plain room. Possibly a cottage or a cabin.

"Mission," Madara states simply, worrying a lock of hair between his fingers. It's grown out past his shoulders, "It's done. We rest tonight, and leave at dawn. I haven't seen you in a while,"

This makes Tobirama's eyes snap back to him, "The travels stopped?"

"No," Madara says, averting his gaze, "I saw Tobirama a month ago. _You_ I haven't seen in a year or two,"

There's a clear accusation in the teenager's tone, and it sounds a lot like-

 _Hn. Not you._

Once again he's separating Tobirama into two entities: his current self, and-whoever Madara was hoping to meet, when he showed up. The thought of this boy knowing things about him that he himself does not know yet makes him unreasonably angry.

Tobirama narrows his eyes, "We are the same person,"

Madara's face darkens, eyes darting down to the dents on the wood of the desk. "Hn. Clearly _not_ ,"

With this, he exits the room, leaving Tobirama speechless, staring after him. Never, in any of the by now dozens of encounters, has Madara ever willingly left Tobirama out of his sight.

Alone in the room, he allows himself to slide down to the floor, his back propped up on the wall. He can feel his own heartbeat, hard and fast, on the back of his throat, anxiety crawling over his skin. It's been a long time since the tight leash he keeps on his temper slipped, even a little bit. This past week is taking it's toll on him, the stress and the doubt getting to him like little does, anymore. Coupled with the feeling that he's in foreign territory, it's enough to have him nearly jumping out of his skin at the slightest provocation. He knows he's on the edge of panic, but it's like there's nothing he can do to stop it.

He stays there, with his head dropped against the wall and his eyes closed, for what feels like hours, staving off the anxiety and hoping for this visit to be a short one, hoping that not much time will have passed once he returns. He can feel Madara and Izuna in the next room, two bubbling bundles of energy in repose and at ease. He concentrates on the contentment he can feel radiating from them, tries to catch some of their calm to wrap it around himself so that it'll keep away the cold he can feel creeping into his bones. Madara is like a furnace, his chakra bubbling bright and nearly unfathomable, with an undercurrent of something dark and nearly too hot, but contained. Next to him, Izuna is more subdued, his control much better, more stable, than his brother's was at that age. They both carry the same signature, the same fire that laps at his senses in a nearly inviting way, like they do not mind him prodding. Once again he wonders at the existence of sensors amongst the Uchiha, then realises that there's a rather large chance he's the sensor that taught them how reach out for him like that. Only it hasn't happened yet.

"Laugh, Tobirama," he mutters to himself, banging the back of his head on the wall, "Laugh, or you might cry this time"

Once it becomes obvious that the visit won't be a short one, he rises to his feet with a sigh. He needs a distraction, something to take his mind away from all the variables he can't control. He wanders into the main room of the cabin, which is just as unfurnished but for a stove where a stew is slow-cooking, and finds the two Uchihas sitting on the floor, a shogi board between them.

"Sure you don't wanna give up, brat? While you still have your dignity?" Madara asks, unconcernedly checking his nails as he makes a move that places the other boy's king in check.

Izuna nearly howls in frustration, "No! I'll beat you this time!"

One look at the board is enough for Tobirama to conclude that no matter the boy's positive outlook, this will not come true. He makes a valiant effort, but Madara has him beat, quite ruthlessly, within five moves.

"Seems like you're on clothes washing duty," Madara says, feigning sympathy.

Izuna sulks with his whole body, "Not fair,"

"Hey, you're the one who said loser does the laundry,"

"Still not fair,"

"You're a terrible loser,"

"Two out of three!" the younger boy pleads. Madara pretends to mull it over, but then shakes his head.

"Nah. Shogi gets old after awhile," he says, and coal eyes meet crimson. After a moment, Madara smiles, "Hey, you can play with him,"

Tobirama raises an eyebrow, askance. Izuna looks positively appalled.

"Nii-san, no!" he whispers quite loudly, "We can't play games with Senjus! Father made a rule about it and everything!"

Madara flushes in embarrassment at that, and Tobirama smirks. It's not very hard to guess why that rule had to be issued.

"T-Tobirama doesn't count! He's from the future! Father's rule only applies to current Senjus," the teenager splutters, "Besides, if he loses, he has to do our laundry,"

"I do not recall agreeing to such thing," Tobirama says, but comes to sit cross legged on the floor. Distraction, he thinks. He needs a distraction.

"Stakes make everything more interesting," Madara grins, resetting the pieces, "Unless you think you can't win against my baby brother, _Senju_ ,"

His tone is playful, taunting, childish, with an undercurrent of affection that cannot be ignored. It is baffling, but Madara considers him someone can joke around with. He's known Tobirama for ten years.

Across from him, Izuna seems to have come to a decision, "Alright. I shall play with the Senju dog. But only because there's guts all over nii-san's haori and I really don't want to touch them,"

He nods, almost to himself, and moves the first piece.

"...guts?"

Madara grimaces, "I loathe explosive tags,"

Tobirama cocks his head to the side, but the boy doesn't elaborate. Izuna clears his throat loudly and scowls at him, calling his attention back to the game. These children are too familiar with his presence for his peace of mind, Tobirama reckons, and makes his first move.

He's sucked into the game immediately, the rules and strategies coming back to him almost without effort. He's reminded of how much he used to enjoy it, as a child, the hours he and Touka spent hunched over the board by the fireplace, Hashirama sitting on a side, narrating the match as if it were a true war and not a game to wile away the hours. He misses his family, he realises with a start. He wonders when they stopped having the time to be a family anymore.

Izuna is very good for his age, alternating moments of outstanding insight with almost clumsy moves of childish impulsiveness as the game progresses. Still, it is wholly entertaining to catch glimpses of the strategical genius in him, the grown man whose fighting prowess Tobirama is so familiar with, in contrast with the child he still is. It's riveting.

Looking to the side, he notices Madara, having grown bored of watching them, has lain down on his side on the floor and is fast asleep, unkempt hair partially obscuring his slack face. His position is open, with his back to the room and his face nearly pressed to the floor, with his thumb hovering near his mouth, forgotten comfort. He sleeps like a child, with absolute abandonment, and it takes Tobirama a few minutes to come to terms with the fact that the boy feels safe with him in the room.

Uchiha Madara sleeps like his neck is not wide open to an enemy's attack, because there are no enemies in the room. The weight of such trust amongst shinobi, amongst warring clans, is staggering.

Tobirama raises his eyes for them to be captured by the inscrutable coal stare of the boy across from him. Izuna regards him evenly, unflinching, suddenly every bit the general he'll someday be but is currently only playing at being.

"I don't like you," he says plainly. Tobirama blinks, momentarily thrown by the honesty. He considers this for a moment, then nods.

"Fair enough," he concludes, "I cannot say I like you myself,"

Izuna nods, satisfied, and moves one of his knights, "Check,"

Tobirama frowns at the board for a moment like it's betrayed him to confirm that yes, his king is in check. Furthermore, a quick scanning of the overall layout of the game allows him to conclude that he's been cornered into a position where his defeat is imminent, somewhere within the next twelve moves.

This realization is also staggering.

"You turned the board around when you heard me coming," Tobirama accuses, aware he's fighting a ten year old but too outraged to care. It suddenly makes sense why the boy's game is so incongruent: he's been pretending to play poorly. All the while he's been laying a trap himself, and it started right when Tobirama wandered into the room and saw him lose.

Where his brother would have grinned beatifically and quite possibly gloated, Izuna shrugs nonchalantly.

"Nii-san did. He hasn't been able to beat me in about a year. The soap is over there in my bag,"

Tobirama's stunned stare goes from Izuna, who calmly looks back at him, to Madara, who's faintly snoring like he hasn't got a care in the little shit.

Played by a couple of brats.

Tobirama's eyes narrow. He steels his resolve, and he utters the words he hasn't spoken since he was twelve years old.

"Best two out of three,"

Izuna grins ferally, expression awkward on a childish face that does not suit him at all, and sets up the board again.

* * *

Tobirama is in the armory, discussing supplies with the smitty and getting progressively more and more agitated at the man's incompetence, and suddenly he's sitting on a cliff overlooking a river. He hurriedly scrambles backwards from the edge.

"You're wondering if it will always be this strange," he hears his own voice say.

His older self approaches him carrying Madara's (Tobirama's…?) black fur cloak. Behind him, Tobirama catches sight of a house with a low roof and expansive windows. He focuses his senses on it.

"Don't even try it," his older self chides, sitting by him on the grass, "We knew you were coming, so I took precautions. Some things you have to figure out by yourself. I shan't tell you about them either, so don't bother asking."

...We? _...Them?_

Effectively, if there's anyone inside the house they have their chakra masked rather expertly, and any sound is drowned by the river's strong current and the whistling of the wind. Tobirama sighs, rubbing his closed eyelids. He's never been this tired in his life.

"I believe I have lost the capacity to be surprised, at this point," he confesses, looking at his older self regard him evenly. His older self laughs, and proves him wrong.

"I'm assuming you already spoke to Madara?"

"He threw a dagger at me,"

The man flinches, hand flying to his temple, as if he can still feel the phantom whisper of silver however many years later, "He's...not very good with words,"

Tobirama stares, "Are you _apologizing_ for him?"

"No, I'm not. Simply stating a fact." is the honest answer, as crimson eyes regard him calmly, "A fact you'd do well by remembering,"

Tobirama gazes into his own eyes, curiosity overcoming trepidation. He didn't get to ask questions last time, but even if he had received every answer he'd wanted he would not have believed it.

Now, though...Now everything has changed.

"How old are you?"

"Forty-two,"

Forty-two. Tobirama mouths the words in wonder. Eighteen years over his current age, and twelve years above the average. He's never allowed himself to toy with the idea of growing to be that old.

"What's the point of all of this?" he asks bluntly, "What's the-the dire warning from the future? What am I supposed to see here?"

He needs a story that he can tell himself. Otherwise, he'll go mad. His older self looks thoughtful for a moment, then raises his eyes to the sky.

"The dream," he says, "You're not supposed to see it, though. Not really. You're supposed to understand that it could actually happen,"

"It's not my dream,"

"It could be. You're-I'm not like Hashirama. Dreams, faith...those were never my strong suit. If I can't see something, then it doesn't-and cannot-exist,"he shrugs, "It's what life taught me,"

"So you tell me that I'm supposed to see that something could happen, but at the same time you won't show me my future because there are things I have to figure out by myself," Tobirama deadpans, askance.

His older self rolls his eyes.

"You think too much," he concludes, "Just don't-don't think so much,"

Tobirama gapes at him, "That's the dire warning from the future? Don't think so much?"

"Yes," is the answer, coupled with a short nod, "And remember: no matter how hard it gets, you're exactly where you need to be,"

The world fades away before he can answer, and Tobirama is in the middle of his brother's study. Hashirama gapes at him from where he's seated behind his desk, pen halted midword.

"I hope that is the new patrol duty schedule you're drafting,"

Hashirama snorts incredulously, then throws his head back and laughs. Tobirama allows himself a smile.

"Torou-san bullied me into finishing it yesterday, actually," still chuckling, Hashirama rises from his seat and wordlessly hands over the spare clothes he's taken to stashing everywhere, from his desk to the stables, "Five hours before deadline. That is a bit of a record, I've been informed,"

It also means that the little meeting he just had with his older self costed him three days, Tobirama muses as he shrugs on the loose tunic and leans against the desk. The sheer amount of time that the travels have costed him by now adds up to a month and a half. There's bags underneath Hashirama's eyes, new lines of worry etched on his face that weren't there scarce months ago. He looks miserable, and scared. His chakra, usually calm like the surface of a lake warmed by the sun, is disturbed. Water is rippling out from a focal point where he's figured out that there is a chance Tobirama won't come back, next time he fades away, and there is nothing he can do about it.

"I'm sorry," Tobirama says, averting his eyes, "that I cannot tell you everything,"

Cannot, will not-he's not certain at this point. All that he knows is that there are shadows in his brother's sunny disposition, shadows that not even a lifetime of war ever managed to put there, and it's all his fault.

Hashirama hums thoughtfully, leaning on the desk as well. He remains in silence for a few moments, and then says, "Remember when we were children and you broke Mother's flying guillotine?"

Tobirama is surprised by the abrupt change of subject, which is why it takes him a moment to splutter, "I did not-"

"You broke it. I was there. You tried to electrify the blades and it broke. You broke it," he chooses to take Tobirama's mutinous silence as acquiescence, which it's not, and continues, "Remember what happened after?"

"I fixed it," is the sullen reply, but Hashirama simply nods.

"And what did I do?"

Tobirama turns his eyes inwards. He remembers fiddling with the obstinate mechanism for hours, tinkering with it until he could finally figure out how it worked. It was his mother's favorite weapon, a relic brought from her home, and he refused to let it become nothing more than a piece of trash. Hashirama had suggested they take it to the smitty, but upon Tobirama's refusal and assurances that he had more chances at fixing it than anyone else, he's sat back against a tree and dozed off. He'd trusted Tobirama fix it, and he didn't doubt him for a second.

Tobirama swallows back a sudden lump in his throat, meeting his brother's kind eyes. Hashirama smiles.

"I know it sometimes feels like we can never be who we were. And I know that things are not as simple now as they were in our childhood, but...but you must know that all my faith rests at your feet. always," he says, conviction dripping from every word, "Do what you must. I have your back on any decision you make, even if you can't tell me what it is,"

"Why?" Tobirama asks, because no matter how old he gets there's a part of him that will forever need the reassurance of his brother's love.

He does not disappoint.

"You're my brother," Hashirama huffs simply, like that explains everything. And truly, it does. "And we did have an awesome lighting-thrower for a little while there,"

Tobirama huffs out a laugh.

"It was rather awesome," he agrees, smiling a bit at the memory, "Before it exploded,"

Hashirama chuckles, "Good times,"

* * *

Tobirama lands face down on the forest floor, and accidentally swallows a dead leaf. Once he's done retching, he places his face in his hands and just sits there, trying to force his mind to keep it together as he breathes in and out. On the edge of his awareness, he feels Madara approach him cautiously.

"Are you alright, Tobirama?"

He peeks through his fingers at the boy. About eight years old this time, dressed in sodden clothes, hair wet and sticking to his pale forehead like wisps of smoke. Tobirama drops his hands from his face.

"Yes, I am,"

Madara's face scrunches up, he closes one eye and cocks his head to the side, "But are you _sure_? You don't look alright,"

Despite himself, Tobirama smiles, "Why ask if you're not going to believe me?"

"Izumi-san says the polite thing to do is ask first," the boy says, nodding sagely as he shrugs off the wet summoning scroll slung on his shoulder, "Or people will think you don't care,"

"Do you care?" Tobirama asks, genuinely curious.

Madara thinks about it for a long, long moment, and then he nods, "Yes, I care," he says simply, activating the seal and handing Tobirama the fur. It's wet, "Izumi-san says that you're supposed to ask people if you can help them in some way?"

The rambling sentence ends on a high note that makes Tobirama chuckle.

"No," he says, "You can't. But thank you,"

"No problem. Oh, hey-" Madara drops his bag, which is dry (what had the boy been doing?) on the floor and riffles through it, the clinking of metal signaling the contents are, in their majority, weapons. Eventually he crows in victory upon finding a mysterious something wrapped in brown paper, and thrusts his finding at Tobirama, who reflexively grabs it.

Peeling away the paper, he blinks at what he finds: a square, slightly misshapen green tea-cake, with an askew smiley face on it.

Madara grins at him, expertly peeling away the paper of his own tea-cake, "Izumi-san lets me grab as many as I want from the kitchens. Eating my favorite dessert always makes me feel a bit better,"

It's such a childish, innocent notion, at odds with the arrow heads and explosive tags he can see peeking from the open gap of Madara's bag, and yet-

"Thank you," Tobirama says, surprised at honestly meaning it, "They're my favorite too,".

There's no denying it anymore. Somehow, against his better judgement, against every single thing he's been taught by life, and in between games of conkers, Tobirama's managed to befriend his most hated enemy.

It is almost an ok thought.


	5. Shipwreck

**Hello! Sorry for the delay. I've been terribly busy, and this story has veered faaaar away from my original idea of shorty, fluffy and time-travely. As for Hisai's letters, I promise they'll make sense soon. That said, I hope you enjoy!**

* * *

 _Day 27_

 _I never thought I'd travel this far out into the ocean. People call it "open water", and I can certainly see what they mean now, but it's not nearly as terrifying as I always envisioned it to 's something unbearably ironic about the possibility of dying of thirst when surrounded by this much water. The only reason I agreed to this expedition, other than the fact that I had no choice in the matter, was the possibility of charting new territory. This is the fifth day we've spent idly floating about in the same patch of blue. The irony is not lost to me, that makes it funny enough that I can't be afraid._

 _A lot of the others are afraid. I hear them praying at night, sobbing every time this piece of shit boat lurches strange, begging for mercy, for life. I tried to tell them praying is stupid, because any god that cares for us shinobi clearly enjoys watching us die in new and exciting ways, but they won't listen. They pray and pray and cry. They want more time. I'd tell them time is relative, but I don't think they'd understand. Mainly, I'm bored out of my mind. The prospect of braving the proverbial dive is looking better and better. The only reason I haven't done it yet is that I keep thinking I have to live, because I have to see her again. That thought alone would keep me sane through the worst of tortures._

 _I like it out here. I'm almost glad the navigator fucked up and got us stranded. It's verdant, somehow, even if that's not the proper word for it. Especially at night, when the water looks black and merges with the sky, and darkness feels alight with color even though I know that's definitely impossible. The darkness shines, flush with stars like someone poked holes in a piece of cloth. When I die I want to get buried at sea._

* * *

"Why is your hair white?"

Tobirama snaps out of his reverie, blinking several times. Bottomless coal eyes regard him evenly, curiously, from under a mat of travel dirty dark hair. Verdant, he thinks.

"It was my mother's hair color," he says by way of explanation. His eyes once again travel to the perimeter, his attention solely on their surroundings and any danger they may pose. He's peripherally aware of the boy's considering expression, the way his nose scrunches up. That means there's another question coming.

"Was she a rabbit lady?"

A few months ago, Tobirama would not have known how to answer that. But by now he has enough practise in dealing with the superb imagination of the children in this particular family that he doesn't hesitate to answer, "The Queen of them all, actually. Every spring, they came from all the nations to braid her hair with flowers,"

Black eyes widen comically, "Even the rabbit on the moon?"

Tobirama smiles a bit despite himself, "Even the rabbit on the moon,"

Across the fire, Madara grins. "Is that why your front teeth are so big?"

This earns him a dirty look, but the boy merely laughs.

"Nii-san!" Yohei chides, pout firmly in place, "You're not supposed to say those things out loud!"

Tobirama huffs in outrage. Madara stuffs a fist in his mouth to stop himself making too much noise as he falls on his back laughing, and Yohei directs a puzzled look at both of them, clearly not realizing what he's said that his brother finds so funny.

Uchiha Yohei is a particularly serene child. He's barely past toddlerhood, yet holds himself with a level head that's unusual for his age. He lacks the temperamental streak Tobirama has come to associate with both of the boy's siblings, the edges of his still fledgling chakra feel more like fire licks than a galvanizing furnace. He asks a lot of questions, but always endeavours to be polite. He smiles a lot, clearly familiar with him, and Tobirama's heart clenches with a grief that's as unnatural as it is raw.

He's never seen this person in his own time, never heard his name spoken in awe and dread across the land. Here is a child that will never grow into his own, who'll probably die before losing his first tooth.

He knows, logically at least, that nothing he can do will stop that. This has already happened, this has already passed. Still, Tobirama is on his guard, his senses stretching outwards in every direction as far as he can take them, alert to any possible threat. There is no way he's letting Youhei die on his watch.

Time is a relative thing, Hisai wrote in his journal. Tobirama is beginning to suspect no one's ever experimented time quite like he has, but all his uncharted territory has done for him so far is lace his blood with the poison of grief.

Tobirama appeared to them an hour and a half earlier, as the boys made camp, readying themselves for a night of vigil awaiting for their father's return from a mission. In true ninja custom, they did not disclose the nature of it, but Tobirama can see the restlessness in their demeanor. Yohei is too young to have been brought as back up, but behind the carefree attitude he puts up for show, Madara is alert and ready to bolt at some unknown signal. At nine, he's already a force to be reckoned with, and his father is honing him for command. His chakra spikes outwards in anxiety, the coiled power of it snapping like the twigs he keeps feeding the fire.

There is a difference to it, but Tobirama cannot quite point it out. He spent his last "travel", as Hashirama's taking to calling them, teaching a slightly older Madara how pack fire chakra into his hand-to-hand fighting style, which meant hours of that corrosive mass of energy snapping at him, biting into his skin even when the boy's punches barely grazed him. He's known Madara's chakra signature since the day they met-such power is difficult to put out of mind-but it's not precisely the nature of it that is different now, less than a year earlier. It's subtle, the difference, but it's there, hidden somewhere. Something dark is missing, something much like grief.

"What was she like?" Madara asks, cutting into his thoughts. He's anxiously pulling out blades of grass and sticking them into his mouth, clearly looking for something to occupy his thoughts with. It takes Tobirama a second to remember they were speaking of his mother.

"Kind," he says, figuring such an adjective is non-disclosive enough. Madara clearly thinks so, if the unimpressed look he receives is anything to go by.

"And…?" he makes a helpful hand gesture to go along with the condescending tone. Tobirama pretends to think about it just to annoy him.

"And propitious,"

He receives a scowl and a blank look, which quickly morphs into outrage.

Yohei points at him and cries, "That's the same word!"

"No, it isn't,"

"Yes, it is! It means the same thing! Same thing, same word!"

Tobirama cocoks his head to the side, "How do you know that?"

Madara shakes his head, letting out a long-suffering sigh, "He plays spelling games in his free time. It's sad,"

Youhei sniffs, "You just say that because I always beat you,"

"Because you cheat,"

"I don't,"

"Yes you do,"

"No,"

Madara raises an eyebrow, "What was your winning word last time?"

"Sable,"

"And which one did you ask me to spell?"

"... _baccalaureate_ ,"

"And that's not cheating?"

"No,"

"Why not?"

"Because I win,"

Madara splutters, "That's not an argument!"

"I still win,"

Madara works his jaw for a moment.

"You know," he says "you've gotten this smarmy comment come back thing just about down to a science."

"I learn at the feet of the master," Youhei says, with the tone of someone who's quoting someone else and isn't quite sure what he's saying, but smiles because it fits and it makes Madara laugh and laugh.

Tobirama watches the exchange in silence, amusement battling with apprehension in his mind. The silence of the night is oppressive once the boys stops speaking, the crackling of the fire the only sound breaking through.

"He's been gone too long," Yohei says softly, resting his chin on his folded knees.

"Easy," Madara replies, a smile dawning on his face like dawn, "He'll be back soon. You'll see,"

"But what if you have to go with him?"

"Then Tobirama will take care of you,"

"Will you?" Yohei asks, worrying his lower lip with his teeth.

Two sets of identical black eyes turn to him, one in expectancy, the other in apology. Tobirama finds he can't quite meet either.

"Yes," he finally says, dropping a hand on the boy's head. "Yes, I will,"

After, when Yohei's fallen asleep, Madara looks at him through the fire and grins a little.

"Sorry about that, It was just to get him to sleep. I know you can't-"

"I promise," Tobirama hears himself say, the certainty in his voice coming as a surprise to both of them, "As far as I can, I promise,"

Madara blinks a few times, then smiles, poking the fire with his stick. Sparks go up into the dark like fireflies, "Alright then,"

* * *

It's a testament to how stressed Tobirama is that he doesn't figure out what's happening sooner. As it is, it takes a rock shattering the window of his study for him to realize what's going on, and by then it's all already escalated to the point that it cannot be fixed easily.

Exhaustion has made him slow. He spent the night before poring over Hisai's notes, trying to find something useful amongst all the journal entries and copious research on various, fascinating topics, but still didn't manage to find anything that might shed some light on his problem. The man's notes are coded, the words painstakingly guarded, and so far his case has little to no resemblance to Tobirama's own, if only because he hasn't yet unlocked whatever part Hisai dedicated to the unexpected side-effects of the hiraishin. Studying the dagger soon turned out to be a dead end as well, for the wicked shard of metal yielded no more information to him than it did to Hikari-sensei.

He's caught in a circle, he's found, like a loop within a loop. He spends his days hobbled over his various scrolls, taking notes and making conjectures, safe in the knowledge that Hashirama trusts him enough to let him do what is necessary to fix his own mistake. His life becomes his study, where he researches and conducts tests-even though he hasn't dared attempt hiraishin once more-and goes through mission reports, trying not to neglect his workload as second in command. Then, he travels to Madara's side. His life lulls to a stop and he breathes for a few minutes-or hours-spent in the company of his greatest foes, before he must return to the present, and deal with the implications of it all.

There's little of Hisai's story he can relate to his own, and yet-and yet, he can't help but feel there's much the man did not speak. That irritating feeling that there's people out there in the world that know more about his own life than himself haunts him when he tries to sleep, but that is the least of his current problems. He's-barely-made peace with Madara's involvement in all this, if only because he still has not reconciled the young child he's come to know with the man he despises.

"You'll cross that bridge when you get there," Hikari-sensei, the only other person he's trusted with the true nature of his travels to, said upon hearing out his predicament. It has since become his motto.

He's been busy, then, trying to force his life into making sense,which only marginally justifies him not paying attention to the rest of the world.

The piercing sound of a shattering window manages to catch his attention just fine.

He snaps out of the light sleep he'd fallen into while trying to read mission reports, and stares at the shards of glass littering the floor like drops of water. He has to blink a few times before everything comes back into focus. Then he groans.

At the centre of the mess, there's a rock with a message tied to it, but he doesn't really need to read it. Reality crashes into him like a wave, and he lets his head drop back. There's a huge cobweb on the ceiling, spanning from wall to wall. The intricacy of the webbing is mesmerizing for a second, a second when he wishes his life were as simple as that of a spider, merely awaiting it's next meal. Then he realizes sleep deprivation is getting to him, and resolves to move his notes to the bedroom, where at least he can not-sleep in the presence of a futon.

He should have foreseen this. Looking back at the past few months, the evidence is there for all to see. The sudden disappearances, the even more sudden reappearances, the impromptu trip to Land of the Waves, the box of baked sweets-picked up by one of the surveillance teams he personally sent out, no less-, the call for help he'd given upon waking up to Madara in his room...all of it left unexplained. Pieced together with the Uchihas' sudden silence and the fact that he's all but secluded himself into house arrest, the whole thing makes a wicked kind of sense.

If anything, he's surprised something like this hasn't happened sooner. They're shinobi after all, and more violent responses have been prompted by less.

He doesn't pick up the rock on his way out of the study, doesn't read the message scrawled there with black ink on murky parchment, but he knows what it says, even if the true meaning of it will take some time to sink in.

 _Traitor_.

* * *

He rolls and gets his feet under him, stands and brings his arms up again, resisting the urge to wipe the dirt from his face. His opponent immediately moves back into a defensive stance and studies him coolly.

It is all tension at this point, each waiting for the other to make a move. He does move then, surges forward and feigns to his right and brings his leg up on the left. She catches the movement, blocks the leg with her arm, grunting as she does so, and they dance apart.

When he charges forward again his opponent charges as well, but she does a half turn and is suddenly airborne. He throws his own arm up to block a fraction of a second too late, the blow strikes the side of his head and Tobirama turns with it. He tries to keep his feet but there is a strike to the back of his knee and he goes down again, with a final sounding thump.

"Just like a sack of potatoes," Tōka says with a touch of mirth in her voice.

Tobirama shoves back to his feet, wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and spits out some dirt. He gives Tōka a sneer and shakes himself.

"Maybe you'd like some tea now?" his cousin questions.

Tobirama gives her the elaborate hand signal that calls for just his middle finger to be extended while he curls the rest of them into his fist. Tōka grins and bows to him.

He ignores her and rolls his shoulders and then stretches his arms back. Grinning, wiry bitch. She is loving this, she's gloating and it rankles him to his very roots that he tasted dirt not just once, but twice. He's clearly out of shape.

She's breathing hard, at least. It mollifies him a little.

"That's a very unsporting gesture," Tōka says, still grinning. Violence always betters her mood, "After all, you are the one who suggested we do this in the first place, I was merely being accommodating."

He huffs. "I said, and I quote, "It's been long since we last sparred," his knee makes a popping sound he's sure it didn't use to make, "and you drop kicked me,"

"You love surprise drop kicks,"

"I do not," he clarifies, just because it needs to be said, then adds, "Be sure to hold on to the first man you find who answers that one with the affirmative,"

She raises an eyebrow, setting her hair bun straight, "Hold on?"

"You'd probably have to hogtie him," he concedes, reaching for his canteen.

Tōka winks, "Wouldn't want it to be too easy,"

"He'd probably be agreeable to that, the poor masochist,"

She laughs, the sound of it cutting through the early morning fog like the mere sound could lift it away. As if on cue, a bird begins chirping, but the gentle breeze carries the sound up and away.

"It's so quiet out here," he breathes out, looking out at the trees that edge the training grounds. His whole body tingles pleasantly with exertion, weeks old tension seeping out of him like a magic trick. He missed this.

"For now," Tōka says, reaching for the canteen and gulping loudly from it, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, "The annoying brats only just start piling in after noon. I swear, they get lazier every year,"

That probably has less to do with laziness, and more to do with the healthy fear all sensible creatures have for the warrior maiden that haunts the fields in the early mornings, Tobirama reckons.

"I'll let Hikari-sensei know people are getting too lenient with the training regimes," he says instead, the diplomat in him forcing itself to the surface. They both flop down on the ground, their dirty clothes already beyond salvaging, and neither says anything for a while, the silence an easy blanket that covers them both. This, he also missed.

"It's easy to forget why all that training's for, once in awhile," Tōka comments, "When everything lulls to a stop...we didn't use to have this much free time,"

It's true. Hashirama being in charge, despite some people's reservations, has been good for the clan. His ideals, for all that they've been problematic, have ensured that no resources are wasted on pointless warmongering, and despite the fact that the wars amongst clans continue on, at least children are excluded from it. Teenagers are many, now that they allow their young time to grow up into their own. An image of Uchiha Yohei appears at the forefront of his mind, amalgamated with the visage of Kawarama and Itama. Old grief resurfaces, but he quenches it down with the ease of practise. He's nothing if not disciplined.

Still, despite all the good it's done, and how nice it is to see their numbers become greater faster than they can get decimated, there are also moments like these past few months, when there's just nothing to do. They are warriors at heart, and silence makes them restless.

"Times have changed," he finally says, looking up at the sky. Everything's changed, "I think the world is getting ready to change again,"

Tōka gazes at him, but there's more curiosity than spite in her eyes this time.

"Have you seen the future, Tobirama? Is that where that artifact came from?"

He huffs at the prospect, "Don't be absurd,"

"We live in absurd times," she states, following his gaze upwards. A leaf tumbles from a nearby maple, and hurtles into their field of vision, "Hashirama is clan leader, we send peace treaties instead of severed heads, our scouts pick up pastries from enemy territory, and-"

Her voice stills like the second before the water comes above the ears.

Tobirama breathes in deep, and takes the plunge.

"...and?"

Tobirama is not foolish enough to believe that she doesn't know, even if he hasn't confessed anything. He doesn't need to look at her to know her eyes narrow.

"And Uchiha Madara shows up at your quarters in the middle of the night, and yet you live,"

The words are spoken in clear accusation, and there is silence. Tobirama closes his eyes and breathes in deep through his nose. A tension in his bones slips away nearly unnoticed, and he realises he's been expecting this for a while now.

"How long have you known?" he asks, curiosity and defeat weighing strangely on the words.

"Since that night. The chakra signature left in that dagger is strange, but unmistakable. I've merely been waiting for you to tell me yourself,"

But you never did, he mentally finishes. He loves her all the more for presenting it to him in such plain, personal terms, and yet shies away from her curt tone.

The excited rumours plaguing the streets those first few weeks after his sudden disappearance at the battlefield have given way to suspicious whispers and outraged cries for explanations. The transformation was gradual, entirely logical, but he'd been too caught up in trying to figure out a solution he hadn't been able to see it. He finally saw it the morning that accusation was flung through his window in the shape of a stone-and how fitting a symbol that was-and he sees it now, clearer than ever, reflected on Tōka's face like a fledgling incrimination mixed with hurt anger. He wholly prefers the shattered glass and the hushed whispers.

In a soft, intimate, yet clear voice, she soldiers on, "Have I not always stood by your side? Have we not played together, fought together, starved together, cried together-have we not shared all there is to be shared between two kindred hearts? Am I not your sister in all but blood?"

There's no answer to that but the truth.

"You are,"

Her eyes snap up to meet his, the coiled hurt there enough to make his thoughts stumble,"Then why do you hide from me? Tell me the truth!", she pleads, "There is nothing you could possibly disclose that would tear me from your side, but this silence-I can't stand it,"

There's enough pain hidden there to make his stomach churn, it's hard for him to meet her eyes. He should have known she'd come to him like this, absolutely ready to forgive him anything, even if he doesn't deserve it, because she's always been like this to him. Even when he was an odd child, both in visage and in mind, she was always the one to drag him into the light, to lay his thoughts bare to the sunlight and force him to make sense.

He knows she doesn't question his loyalty, like so many others have made abundantly clear with harsh looks and veiled threats now he's finally lifted his head from his research for longer than a few seconds at a time. She's made it clear that what she questions is his trust.

"If I told you-" he begins haltingly, then changes his mind and rearranges his thoughts. He needs to make her understand that it's not that he doesn't trust her to know the whole truth, but at the same time knows that implying he's trying to spare her pain would be the worst he could do at the moment. He settles for saying, "It would be worse for you to know the truth,"

Her jaw sets in a familiar stubborn line,"Let me be the judge of that,"

He laughs a little, but there's no humor in it.

"I can't,"

And he truly cannot. He can't hurt her like that, can't let the weight of a knowledge she can do nothing about settle in her soul to rot. What would she say, he wonders, if she knew Tobirama is in a position to eliminate the murderer of her beloved siblings?

"Tobirama-"

What would she say if she knew he won't do it because it would cause him pain to do so?

"It's no concern of yours," he says, regretting the words as they come out of his mouth.

Tōka probably knows this, but still recoils from him as if struck. She rises to her feet and walks away. A thousand emotions chase themselves within his chest cavity upon rising to chase her, but most of all he's simply exhausted.

"Tōka-" he pleads, reaching for her shoulder.

She catches the hand and effortlessly flips him over her shoulder. Before he knows it, he's once again looking up at the sky.

"Save your breath, cousin," Tōka spits out somewhere above him, "You've made your point abundantly clear,"

She reached out an olive branch to him, and he threw it back in her face. Knowing you deserve someone's scorn doesn't make it any easier to bear.

* * *

 _Day 32_

 _I loathe the seal. Loathe it like I've never loathed anything else. Not because it's a symbol of slavery-which it it-or because that fucker Uzumaki put it there-which he did-but because it itches. All the fucking time. I know it sounds like nothing, and it looks stupid written down, but it's driving me insane. It's right there in the middle of my back, where I can't reach it. I've half a mind to rub against a wall or something, just to take the edge off. It kind of makes me regret refusing to just swear allegiance to the Uzumakis back when I could. I'd kiss that asshole's Uzumaki Tezuna's fucking feet to get the fucking thing off._

 _They wouldn't take it off, anyway. They don't trust me, which is smart of them. I'd sooner slit my own throat than do their bidding out of my own free will. Not that I can't slit my own throat now, mind you-the seal controls my chakra, not my mind-but I can't really bring myself to do it. You said we'd meet again, so I can't die until then. Still, the damn thing itches. Nami-san pretends she can't feel it, but I know hers itches too. If she weren't such a stuck up bitch with all her bloody poise, we could scratch each other's backs-quite literally-but she scoffed when I suggested it. I thought it was a perfectly good idea._

 _She's the only one I can talk to in this boat, and she's a bitch. All the Uzumakis think I'm some kind of monster because a Namikaze once killed their cat or something, like they didn't slaughter my entire family and turned me into a juiceless slave. I would have thought that little detail would make us all even, but turns out that's not the case. There's no cure for what we were, I guess. Eternal enemies, until the end of times. It figures. I should really stop hoping fate to smile at me._

* * *

They lie side by side on a patch of grass by the lake, Madara's favorite spot since childhood. Madara is fast asleep, exhausted from a morning of hard work. He's lying on his side, facing him, with all his hair on his face like an effective curtain against the sunlight pouring over them both. It surprises Tobirama, sometimes, the ease with which the teenager sleeps when he is around, especially since he himself can count on the fingers of one hand the people he allows himself to sleep in the presence of. He can appreciate the silence, though, even if the trust behind the gesture is a little beyond him.

Tobirama lies on his back, dressed in borrowed, slightly-too-small clothes, and scrutinizes the cloudless sky, a habit he's picked up lately. Hashirama found symbolism in it, naming the sky as the only constant this cruel back and forward yanking is leaving him with, and Tobirama is inclined to agree. If there's one thing that'll never change, it is the sparkling, infinite cerulean of the firmament. He finds himself comparing it to the wondrous infinity of the ocean as Hisai described it in his journal, that shining darkness that spans out as far as the eye can see. There's comfort to be found in such a constant, even when it's deadly.

So much he used to believe unshakable-the trust of his clan, Toka's friendship, his own hatred for those he considered his enemies-has proven itself to not be so in such little time he feels as though his whole world has been yanked out of balance. He does not know how to return it to the way that it was, or at least how to shape it all into something he can work with. He feels as though he's idly floating in the deep blue sea, stationary and visible, slowly but surely sinking under the surface. He loathes to think what might happen if he doesn't find a way to keep his head above water. He's thankful for Hashirama's faith in him, but he's not certain faith alone will get him through this ordeal.

For all that his brother trusts him, and Tobirama loathes the idea of failing him, he simply doesn't know where to start. He doesn't know how to keep his head in the present when the past so often calls him back, and he doesn't know how to assuage his clansmen's doubts-he doesn't even know how to deal with the distant possibility that he might meet Madara in his present once more, which is that terrifies him the most. He can deal with the thinly veiled accusations from the elders and the members of the council, he can even deal with the pain of Toka's silence-he has no idea what he'll do if he ever finds himself standing before Madara with a battlefield between them, instead of a few inches of sun-warmed grass.

"You're thinking again," the object of his musings accuses, voice cracking with sleep.

"No, I'm not," he answers automatically, then rolls his eyes when he realises that's what the boy intended, and glances at him. Madara smiles, but doesn't open his eyes.

"What's troubling you?" he asks, still not moving, but holds up a hand before Tobirama can speak, "Before you say you can't tell me anything about the future because it's a rule, blah, blah, consider...disguising the truth,"

Tobirama raises an eyebrow, "That habit of bending the rules for your benefit speaks lowly of your honour, Madara,"

"Shinobi," the boy calls simply, as if that's all the explanation needed. Which it is, "Now answer the damn question, old man,"

"You're older than me,"

"Not right now. Right now I'm eighteen, and you're an old man. You have grey hair and everything,"

Tobirama rolls his eyes at the sky, but his mirth quickly evaporates when he remember his current predicament. Haltingly, he says, "There are some within my clan who find me...suspicious,"

"That's what happens when you steal people's clothes from hanging lines one too many times, pervert"

Tobirama elbows him, hard, but Madara snickers, finally opening his eyes, and rolls away. He turns onto his stomach, resting his weight on his arms to better appreciate Tobirama's scowl.

"We're shinobi," he says, plucking pieces of grass and suckling on them, fruitlessly looking for sweet grass, "Suspicion is in our nature. A few days ago, my cousin was accused of sleeping with the smitty's wife because of the way he flinched when the man picked up a club hammer,"

Tobirama considers this, then asks, "And was he guilty?"

"Oh, very much so," the says, three blades of grass clenched between his teeth as he grins brilliantly at Tobirama's scowl.

"What was your point again?"

"My point is that we're right to be suspicious, because it often means the difference between life or death-or, in this case, knowing you're a cuckold or not," he laughs a little at the word, but sobers up soon enough and shrugs, "You can't ask people to forget their nature,"

Tobirama rolls the word around in his head as he watches an errant cloud. It's strange that Madara would speak of nature, when such a thought's been plaguing Tobirama for some time. The trouble with time is that it often makes us forget ourselves, Hisai told him a while back. He finds himself drifting back to these words often these days, wondering what it is that remains of a person after time has done what it must to them. Nature, Madara calls it. He gazes back at him, watches him for few moments. It occurs to him that Madara is a man, and has been for a time.

"What is your nature?" he finally asks.

"What's yours?," Madara counters, eyes dancing, "You're the most changeable person I know,"

Tobirama can see how, from his perspective, that's quite a valid point. Still, it rankles him a bit. "At least now you refer to me as a single person,"

Madara huffs out a laugh, "That really bothered you, huh?" he waves around a blade of grass, "I must remember that. For future emotional blackmail and such,"

Tobirama stares at him. The image of Madara standing in his room, sneer firmly in place, comes back to him lightning quick.

Hn. Not you.

Unbelievable. He really remembered. He's torn between laughing hysterically or punching him in the face for something he hasn't even done yet, but finally settles for doing neither, tracking his way back into the conversation and filing away that piece of information for later.

"You can't ask people to forget their nature," he repeats with a sigh, "Then what? What can you do?"

Other than work yourself up into a state of anxiety so bad you wind up asking your greatest enemy for advice.

"You can remind them of yours," Madara says resolutely, coal eyes wide and certain, "Maybe you can't bare your soul to the world, but nature shines through,"

"You believe that?"

"I do," he says with a nod, then grins, "It's in my nature,"

"Is it in your nature to fraternize with wayward Senju?"

Madara pretends to think about it, "Only the ones with a tendency to mope,"

"I don't mope,"

"You do! You're better at hiding it, but you're worse than Hashirama, sometimes,"

There's silence. It isn't so much that Hashirama is a forbidden topic, or they've made a point not to talk about it, it's just that neither of them has ever brought him up. Here's this other piece of string between them, that's tied them together since the beginning. Tobirama's dear brother, and Madara's estranged friend.

Tobirama's sees the person Hashirama saw when he met Madara, sees the friend his brother tried to convince him he'd found. The problem is that he also sees the ruthless enemy, the creature he's dedicated his life to fight against. It's like, in his mind, he too divides Madara into two people, and the both of them exist in different universes that can never overlap. Most days, both universes stand apart from one another, but define this person by his side nonetheless, battling each other for dominance into a perfect standstill. Some days-like today-one of them wins.

Tobirama groans in frustration, covering his face with his hands, "Why won't you accept the peace treaties?"

"Huh?" Madara looks so confused it would be funny, if he weren't so close to mental breakdown.

"Not you," he sighs, "Future you. We keep sending you peace treaties, and you never accept them,"

His statement is met with silence, but Madara is nothing if not verbose. His jaw clicks audibly before he innocently asks, "Isn't that a violation of the no future talk rule?"

"I don't give a fuck,"

"Oh, we are swearing! That means things are bad,"

"Just answer the question," Tobirama snaps.

Madara doesn't meet his eyes, thoughtful gaze fixated on the grass, "I can't answer the question. That's not me yet,"

Tobirama rakes his hand over his face, "But if-if nature shines through, if that's what pulls us together or tears us apart, then-then what? I'm the same person. Why aren't you?"

He knows he's being unfair, but the truth is that he doesn't care anymore. He needs to know. He needs an answer, any answer, otherwise he'll go mad trying to figure it all out on his own.

"Maybe I'm waiting," Madara says with a shrug.

That is not helpful. Tobirama grits his teeth.

"For what,"

"For a sign," the young man answers, then looks away and smiles a little,"Or maybe I'm just waiting for you,"

He suddenly feels as if the floor's been swept away from underneath him, the false light of Madara's tone having a strange effect on him,

"For me?" he asks, quite certain he didn't hear correctly.

Madara still doesn't look at him, "I'm always waiting for you,"

He's stunned into silence by that. Thankfully, Madara doesn't seem to be expecting an answer, flopping back onto his stomach after a while and hiding his face with his hair. Tobirama's thoughts scatter around, but he can't concentrate on anything. His world is changing again, but the sky's still perfect blue. The dichotomy is such he needs to close his eyes.

He's working himself up to a fret when he feels Madara's body up against his side. He opens his eyes, but Madara appears to be fast asleep. As Tobirama watches, he can see Madara's eyes moving under his lids, and feel Madara shiver. He shifts closer, and Tobirama eases up and away gently, reaching out for the discarded scroll his cloak is kept in, doing a quick job of activating it.

Before he can spread it over Madara, he turns onto his side, creeping closer to Tobirama and curling in on himself. Tobirama drapes the fur over Madara before he lay back down, putting his arms under his head and looking up at the sky with a yawn. To his surprise, he feels one of Madara's hands spreading out over the curve of his side, right over where his heart beats, a little faster now.

Faster? He forces his breathing to slow, a million thoughts crowding inside his skull. He considers pushing Madara away, then decides against it, then considers it again, and wonders if it'll be long before he's called back to his time and-

"You're thinking again," Madara mumbles, nuzzling closer. His nose is cold even through the fabric of his borrowed tunic.

Tobirama blinks up at the sky, then settles for a chuckle.

"Sorry," he says, but Madara does not hear it. He's asleep again.

Tobirama looks up at the blue sky until his eyes can't stay open any longer.

* * *

 _Day 52_

 _We swam for a bit today, trying to get rid of the accumulated tension and cabin fever, and very close to me I saw a shark fin breaking the surface of the water, that turned out to belong to a porpoise. I've never been so pleasantly surprised in my life. Despite my recent finding that death does not worry me, the prospect of being torn to pieces-or, gods forbid, chewed-is a very unappealing one._

 _That being said, I must admit that the few seconds between when I saw that tell-tale finn and the moment the creature lifted it's head above water to reveal not round after round of sharp teeth but a rather affable smile, I honestly thought I was going to die. I thought I understood time, but for a second I thought I was running out of it and I realised I didn't have the first clue. Rather than feeling scared or regretful of leaving this world behind, I felt overwhelming disappointment that I would not get to see you, one last time. To hear you sing and watch you dance...you'd be heaven for anyone, but you're especially heaven for a damned man like me. I'm idly floating in the deep blue sea, I feel like all my life's comprised of this endless wait for you._

 _My companions no longer pray, this trip of horrors apparently having drained them of any belief they might have left, even after a life of war. For some reason, near death experience aside, I find myself more spiritual than ever. Here I thought myself a cynic, but I find that's not the case. Fear stilled the words in my mouth before I could tell you last time, but this time nothing will. I think I've spent my life being afraid of all the wrong things, darling. If-when- I return to you, I'm not waiting any longer. If we never reach land, and I get my wish of a water burial, I'm glad I realised this much: I love you I love you I love you, and I'll always feel the same._

* * *

Things have a way of snowballing.

What began with a rock through his window and surreptitious looks and whispers escalates to an outright riot at their door the next time they hold council at their house. Hashirama's mokuton comes in handy in that it restrains but doesn't cause bodily harm, but the fact that he's the one who does it doesn't sit well with anyone involved. The rioters are to spend a week in the brigs as per Hashirama's impulsive order.

Tobirama wants to protest, wants to tell him that's not the solution, but undermining his brother's authority in public would be the worst he could do, now he's been labeled something of a traitor. The looks and the whispers are worse after that, if only because the focus is no longer Tobirama's oddity, or his-supposedly-questionable allegiance. The focus becomes his brother's ability to command them. How can he do right by the clan if he has a soft spot for the traitor?

 _You can't ask people to forget their nature._

Tobirama hears Madara's voice in his head, and he thinks of Hisai stranded somewhere in the southern seas, as his boat sinks lower and lower.

There's always been doubt. For all that Hashirama is the most powerful out of them all, for all that he's the rightful heir, he isn't loved by all, and his views are not shared by all. But that's what Tobirama's always been there for. They are a team. He's been away from his duties for too long. He sets the dagger on his desk, and looks at it.

"I _need_ to be here," he says, voice dropping into a plea. He's truly pleading, to an inanimate object, to a god, to Madara. He doesn't know. He doesn't care, either, "I _have_ to stay here. _Please_ , let me stay,"

Nothing happens. Tobirama lets out a long breath.

* * *

It works.

* * *

Tobirama doesn't travel for two months. It's easy to shush whispers and quench doubts when he has enough time to dedicate to his duties as second in command and he no longer disappears every two days. Hashirama has always been a force of nature, hurtling forward like a strong river current. Tobirama is fine with that-he's always been the one who banks the power. He smooths the way, eases the passage. It's always been his job. Falling back into it is easy, once people begin remembering he's only ever been loyal to them.

 _You can only remind them of yours._

Part of him is annoyed that Madara was right, but the rest of him is simply glad for the advice. There's a longing in his bones that begins with a feeling of not being where he's supposed to be, and it takes him a few weeks to realise he misses Madara and, to a lesser extent, Izuna and Yohei, even if thought of the later makes his heart clench with misplaced grief. He's become accustomed to those children, he realises with wonder, but he doesn't long for the travels to start up again.

(Carefully, he locks the memories of that last travel behind a steel trap door in his mind, and barely allows himself to recall Madara's bittersweet smile. It's not the time to ponder, it's not his place to question. He tells himself he'll deal with it when he has time. He tells himself it's for the best. He forces himself not to wonder why it affected him so much.)

Once in awhile, he pulls out the dagger from the drawer it's in and watches the power in it dance. He thinks of Madara as he was and as he is, and works himself into anxiety wondering what the man is doing, what he's thinking, what he's waiting for. In this, he knows he's not the only one.

The hardest part is trying to dispel the anxiety that clings to everyone in the compound like a cloak of darkness. Eight months now, and not a sign of the Uchiha, not a word, not a whisper. His scouts return empty handed. For all they know not one of them has stepped out of their land since that last great battle, save for that one visit from Madara, so long ago it seems.

"What should we do?" he asks, looking out the window. The day is grey and miserable, and he can feel a headache coming. He questions himself, his companion or the wind, he does not know.

Hikari-sensei answers either way, "Things have a way of snowballing. When the avalanche comes down, all we can do is hope to keep our heads above the snow,"

That echoes his thoughts so perfectly he has to laugh, but the sound is not happy.

* * *

 _Day 72_

 _I'm starting to believe we'll never find land. This expedition has turned out to be a true fiasco. Food is not scarce-I'm thankful of porpoises and their silly habit of chasing boats-but water is becoming a problem. Most of all, I've found the isolation is the greatest foe of a stranded crew. There's too few of us, and seeing the same faces every day, all of us weighed down by the sun and the heat, does things to the mind._

 _Nami-san dreamed that the boat sank into the bottom of the ocean, and became part of a reef. An octopus commandeered our tiny cabin and made himself a home in my hammock. It would be a nice death, I'd wager. Peaceful._

 _I read a book about the end of the world once, but it wasn't all fire and brimstone or a great and terrible war, like one would imagine. It was quite simple: in the story, the world was birthed from a great ocean, like an island rising above the waves, and like every island the ocean would eventually swallow it back up. Then it became quite imaginative: as the world sank, a great water dragon would rise from the the very depths of the ocean, and it would swallow the sun, plunging everything into inescapable darkness- a rather good ending, I think. Sounds like something to look forward to._

* * *

When it finally happens, they've been expecting it for so long it's almost a relief, except for where it is like being plunged into the depths of a cold ocean, where ice grips at you like the fingers of a ghost.

It begins simple enough: with a mission. Infiltration and assassination, as straightforward as they come. This part is routine enough, but the problem comes with the location of the target: inside a well protected fortress, right on the border with the Land of Wind. A hard mission, requiring a month worth of preparation and careful planning, and still the outcome is uncertain.

The approaching party is wealthy and ambitious, with their eyes set on political gain, but that is nothing new. If ever Tobirama despaired at the petty things his people risk their lives over, he stopped doing it as soon as he understood there's really no walking away from one's nature: a shinobi is a shinobi is a shinobi. They can disguise themselves as they wish, but for all that times have changed they remain mercenaries at their core. Tobirama knows all this. He knows the location, how well protected the target is, and what it would take to get it done. He knows he's the one best suited for it, if it weren't for his-condition.

Tōka offers to do it. He tells her no.

But Tōka is the head of assignments. She knows the intelligence on the location of the target. She knows more than he does, in all likelihood. She's in charge of who goes there. And when the second party she sends doesn't come back, she approaches him again.

"Twice we've failed, Tobirama," she tells him, jaw set in a hard angry line. They haven't spoken more than what's strictly necessary since that day on the training grounds, despite Hashirama's complaints that he doesn't want to take sides, "Are you expecting a written apology?"

He tightens his grip on his quill, "You think I'd hold you back from a mission you're suited for because of a personal resentment?"

"I fail to find any other reason, especially when we both know I'm the one most likely to succeed,"

"Most likely is not a certainty," he states, then stands, "I will go,"

"You can't," her eyes soften minutely at this, "Just because it hasn't happened in a month or two it doesn't mean it won't happen. At the worst possible moment,"

The last thing they need is for him to travel in the middle of a mission, disappearing for however long, only to return behind enemy lines. He clenches his teeth.

"Little cousin," she says, the endearment dropping from her lips for the first time on so long it throws him for a moment, "You're stalling. You're being foolish. What we need is someone with considerable speed and precision, and I'm second only to you. It is not ideal, but,"

She trails off with a shrug, but he knows the look in her eyes. Nothing he can say will stop her now.

"You'll be careful,"

She doesn't punch him, but it's a near thing. With a promise to return in ten day's time, she's gone.

* * *

Her armour, or what's left of it, is found at the gates of the compound on the morning of the ninth day. On the broken chestplate, in a splash of red and stark against the clear silver, is the crest of the Uchiha.

* * *

 _Day 98_

 _I think I hear the dragon rising up to swallow the sun._


End file.
